Over the Hills and Far Away
by sbgrrl
Summary: An encounter with a witch sends Dean and Sam back to 1975, where they struggle to find a way home without technology they're used to, and while one of them tries to hold onto his sanity. Set in late S3.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: This story is complete, but I don't want to dump the whole thing here. I'll chapter it up for easier reading._

**Over the Hills and Far Away**

**Chapter One **

_March, 1975 _

They were everywhere, and multiplying fast. Dean wrested himself from the hold on his arms, powering forward. They had his brother. Sammy. Sam. This was wrong, wrong place, wrong time. Hands. Black demon eyes. Fire, fire, no. Bright lights. They were taking Sam somewhere away from him. If he could only think past the panic, but he couldn't. Sam was the only thing keeping him _him_. Seconds after freeing himself, Dean was caught again. Couldn't move, only inches. It wasn't enough. The panic bubbled. He could feel it, in his gut, his hands. He was sure his brain was fizzing like a goddamned can of Coke.

"Get your hands offa me," Dean shouted. Sam wasn't moving, but they were taking him. "Sam. Sammy!"

No one listened. No one helped him. Only Sam could, and Sam was… Dean got his arms free and swung wildly, his chest tight with a cough that wouldn't come. Fire. Smoke. He killed it, it was dead. He knew it was. Fight fire with fire. Demons all around him, spreading like an epidemic. Help, oh … oh. He couldn't see Sam anymore. One of the demons who had him wrenched his right arm behind his back, and up.

"The fire," he shouted. "Demons. Wrong time. Have to get back, back to the future. It's our density!"

"You want to give me a hand here, Reed?" one of the demons said, then grunted as Dean elbowed him with his left arm. "This one's got a real bee in his bonnet."

Breath hot on Dean's neck. Hot, burning. Fire demons. His skin would start blistering if he didn't get free soon. Everything started to fracture before his eyes. Black-eyed people loomed around him, each one becoming three, then four, until all he could see were faces with black eyes. They were suffocating him. He had to get to Sam. Sam needed him and he thought maybe he needed Sam even more. Knew it, the only thing he knew.

"Put him in six, and call extra security down here. Mike, we'll need psych."

One last effort yielded a knock of his forehead against the frame of a door, another bruise. If they got him in that room, Dean knew they would torture and then incinerate him just like they were doing to Sam right that very second. He screamed and kicked as they lifted him onto a thin mattress. They were so strong. Too many of them.

"Hold him. Get the restraints on him, now."

It was the leader demon speaking, Dean realized. He was in some sort of demon nest. He bucked, refused to give up. It wasn't in his blood to give up, and even if it was, he couldn't. Sam, he had to get to his brother. Couldn't. Too-strong hands held him fast and strapped him down. He must be on some kind of torture rack. Oh shit, oh god, Sam. This wasn't right. He had to think, think. Everything swirled above him, faces. A ceiling of big squares filled with holes. Couldn't catch his breath. He didn't want to die, he wasn't ready yet. This wasn't supposed to be happening. Sam was, where was Sam? His brother, at least was supposed to survive. The deal. He'd made the deal so Sam could live. But that was then, hadn't happened yet, because now was back then and _not right_ time. Something metal and big, reached for him like a malformed arm.

Dean screamed. Terror. And he knew, deep down, how wrong this was. Winchesters didn't scream. Think, think. Had to keep his brain straight. A prick on his arm, something sliding into his veins like ice water. Dean thrashed on the bed, couldn't free himself. Felt his arms turn to wet noodles. Spaghetti arms. Oh no, oh no, no, no. He had to … something. Some … couldn't remember. _Thwapthwap_. The multitude of demonic images went hazy, then disappeared.

* * *

><p><em>Thirty-three years later<em>

"I friggin' hate witches," Dean grumbled. "We just got done dealing with them last week or something, didn't we?"

Dean put a hand on his stomach, feeling sharp razor blades tear him up from the inside all over again. Some memories were visceral, too real and too much like what he imagined he'd signed up for, for eternity. He tried to tell himself it was different, that the Hell pain would be easier to take because it meant Sam was above ground. Even though he'd long ago given up the pretense he was okay with his afterlife home being built in the Pit, he still didn't like it to show. For Sammy's sake.

"It was months ago, and this one's more serious, Dean, not a bunch of misguided housewives looking to get rich quick," Sam said, sounding about as bone weary as he looked.

Whatever. It didn't matter to Dean the motivation, witches were all skanky and gross and that included Sam's little guardian devil. Hell, Ruby was at the top of the witch skank list as far as Dean was concerned. He didn't like the way she smelled, and he didn't like the way she hovered around Sam. She was up to something. Dean didn't know what; he didn't have to, to know it was no good. His stomach turned over, this time not from reliving razorblades. He didn't want to think about Ruby or whatever she was up to.

He and Sam hadn't found any murdered bunnies yet, but Dean was sure they were bound to any time now. Some poor rabbit was probably seconds away from becoming splatter as they sat here twiddling their thumbs into next week. He had to give Sam the point – their witch of the hour was not an amateur. Everything that had been done had been under the radar of regular cops, a series of unfortunate accidents that all happened to be related.

Dean hadn't been paying close enough attention to say how, but if Sam said there was a connection, there was. His own mind just wasn't on the hunt, or any of their hunts for the last month or so. He knew Sam was still looking for a way out of his deal and would keep doing that until the very end. Dean knew in his gut, which twisted even more, that there was no way out. He was scared out of his mind to die, but at the same time had no regrets.

"Dean, are you even listening to me?" Sam asked, as he slapped Dean on the shoulder.

"Sure, I am," Dean said, lying and not knowing why.

"Then what did I just say?"

Normally, it was times like this he could quote Sam word for word, if he had to, to prove a point that a person didn't have to be an uptight tool for his brain to be working. He supposed he should be glad Sam was intent on a regular hunt for the moment, and try to pretend to himself that in less than two months Dean wouldn't be dead and burned. All he could think about was that, though.

"I dunno. Blah, blah, blah, witches, blah." Dean grinned, all the while knowing it would make Sam upset. It was all he had anymore, really, that came close to normal, making Sam mad. "What does Bobby think?"

Sam huffed and shot him a scowl, the same way he always did but now tempered with genuine anger and fear. Dean knew. He knew exactly what he had condemned his brother to live through, because he hadn't been able to himself. Sam was more independent and always had been. Sam had already chosen to live without Dean once, and he could do it again. He had to. Dean wondered if he told himself that often enough, then Sam would magically think him roasting in Hell was just like when Sam ditched them for Stanford.

"Hey," Dean said, "we both know Bobby is the font of all knowledge. The man's more of a geek than you, in a greasemonkey sort of way."

"He is," Sam said, with a halfhearted laugh. "Haven't heard back from him yet. I'll call him in a few hours if we don't hear from him first."

Having Bobby at their backs for the last two years had probably saved them more times than Dean could count, and in more than one way. Without Bobby, he wasn't sure he'd have been able to handle it after Dad died. Not as Sam started being more and more like the things they'd normally kill, not after Sam died in a goddamn puddle of mud in South Dakota, not this whole year of demons and the clock on Dean's deal winding down.

He defied anyone to fault him for not having his head in the witch hunting game.

Dean knew damn well Bobby was splitting his time between a heavy caseload from a lot of hunters, him and Sam, and a search for a way to save his life. He didn't like what Sam and Bobby were doing, half expected Sam to drop in his tracks because that was how good Bobby was at finding solutions; he'd stumble on the wrong one and get Sam dead. He also knew he couldn't stop them and would be doing the same thing if the situations were reversed. They couldn't screw up more than he had, except they could. Sam was supposed to be the one to survive, and he would. Dean had to make sure of that, somehow.

"What do you say we take it easy for tonight? Go out, have a few beers. You know, live a little."

"You go ahead," Sam said, no hesitation. "I'm going to keep at it."

The sad, sorry fact of the matter was, Dean didn't want to go out alone. He didn't want to hook up with any more women. He didn't want to drink until he sloshed when he walked. He also didn't want to stay in the room watching Sam toil away on a hunt that, in the long run, didn't matter. The only thing left for him to do was start thinking about this skanky ass witch and how to dispatch it. Not his favorite way to spend a Saturday night. Dean huffed and gave Sam a scowl, mirroring his brother's earlier grouchy look as closely as possible. Kid should know how big of a douche he looked when he did that.

"Fine. Work it is, but I need some food. You want anything?"

Sam pondered, then said, "Hasenpfeffer."

It took a second for it to click in Dean's head, and then he had to hand it to Sam. That was actually pretty funny. He had no intention of letting Sam know it, of course. He was the funny one in the family, always had been and would be until the day he … died. Soon. Shit, shit. Everything came back to that. He was teetering too close to being the unfocused fool who got them hurt or killed.

"Smartass," Dean said as he mentally doused images of Hellfire. He shuddered and pretended it was about witches, not Hell. "You know there's always a dead rabbit."

Sam smiled, though briefly. "I think we're beyond rabbits. Not enough blood. Well, except for, you know."

He didn't need the reminder of what was at stake. The world was swimming in demons and monsters and innocent people who still needed to be protected. There were so many innocent people who couldn't care about Dean Winchester in the slightest, even if he might have saved someone separated by six degrees from them. Hah. He bet he could get to Kevin Bacon fast.

"Fantastic, a superwitch." Dean pulled the jacket off the bed and put it on. He noticed the pinch around Sam's eyes and determined food was needed even if the guy didn't want anything. "I'll be back in a few."

"Be careful, all right?" Sam twitched, a tick that got worse when he was emotional. He always twitched. "I have a weird feeling about this one."

"Hey, it's me," Dean said.

"How is that supposed to make me feel better, exactly?"

"Ha ha."

Dean let himself out, stepped into a musty, dark hallway. The place was a tinderbox. If one sleazebag forgot to put out a cigarette after a roll in the proverbial hay with a hooker, it'd go up in a matter of minutes. He didn't like the thought and decided he'd push for an upgrade when he got back. Sam wouldn't go for it at first, but if Dean played the "going to be dead in two months" card, his brother would do just about anything. He put his hand on his stomach as he walked, acid seeming to burble. It hampered his hunger, but then just about everything did. Food had become his last distraction, a way to pretend everything was normal. He had exhausted all the diversions not relevant for maintaining life. Sex, booze, the usual.

Despite the bravado he couldn't seem to let go of, ever, Dean was as nervous about this case as Sam. More, probably. All of the known casualties had gone out with a bang, some of them literally. LA was a big city and the chances of him randomly running into their witch while he was picking up a sack of burgers and fries were slim, but he was a guy who'd puked razorblades and knew he didn't have to see a witch to have one try to kill him. He hoped that because they hadn't pinpointed a suspect yet meant the suspect hadn't pinpointed them. Shit, he was turning into a pussy looking over his shoulder in his golden months.

He bet Tara Benchley could take his mind off his worries for a few hours. He smiled. She had a nice … trailer. Food, new digs for him and Sam and a night of trailer rocking with a movie star. Maybe he could find a way to make this hunt not so terrible after all. It was the little things that kept the nastiness of witches at bay. Sure. Right. Sometimes the old tricks worked fine, like when it was a famous woman on the bed beneath him.

Dean opted for burgers and fries because he'd seen the place from the car earlier. In a stroke of unWinchesterlike luck, he had no problems at all with the dinner run. He wasn't hungry, hungry, but the smell of greasy French fries and salt had his stomach growling anyway. Hopefully, Sam would eat something; he'd been on single-minded intense attack mode for the better part of ten months. It wasn't healthy. Look what it had done for Dad. Dean knew that kind of behavior could sustain a man for decades, but he didn't _want _that for Sam. He wanted Sam to have as normal a life as possible, the life he himself could never have.

"They didn't have any of your pansy ass salads or fake no-meat burgers, so you're going to have to suck it up and eat what I brought you," Dean said by way of announcing his return.

Sam didn't answer or respond at all, and for a change Dean didn't care. His brother was fast asleep, nose pressed awkwardly against the laptop keyboard. On the screen, Google was showing no search results for "sejknaonioeuniiwea9rui8(*EY". Big surprise, there. Dean debated trying to move Sam to a more comfortable location or leave him be, and leave him be won out by the knowledge that if Sam woke up even a little, he'd be back at it. All of it. The witch-hunt, the desperate search to break an unbreakable deal with a crossroads demon. And, honestly, Sam was in no danger of starving but the likelihood of him burning out was reaching critical mass.

There hadn't been a real debate. Dean carefully slid the laptop out from under his sleeping brother's face and ate both the burgers while he picked up the geek stuff where Sam had left off. Sam wasn't the only one in the family with brains, he was just the only one who made a federal case out of it. And because Sammy got such a hard-on for the research aspect of hunting, it had never been such a bad thing to let him rule that part of it. When they were growing up, it was the only thing Sam truly enjoyed and Dean had learned at a very young age that beggars could never be choosers.

He was elbow deep in gory police reports of the victims Sam had linked, trying to see the connection more clearly, when Sam let out a snuffling snort and a "nyahhah" and rejoined the land of the conscious. Dean almost laughed, then saw the hollow look of something dark and haunted in his brother's eyes. It was the same look he'd seen a million times now, all of them since Sam had died and come back to life. He didn't like thinking about it, but it lingered in the back of his mind with everything else, how Sam was not quite right these days.

"Morning, princess," Dean said. "I ate your dinner."

"Wasn't hungry anyway," Sam mumbled. He stood, stretched and glanced blearily at Dean. "How long was I asleep?"

"Not long enough."

"Dean."

"Sam, you look like crap and you know it." Dean hadn't forgotten his plan for the evening, despite the refresher course in all things bloody and witchy spread out on the bed in front of him. "I was thinking we might see if we can find a better place to hole up. This place is an accident waiting to happen. Maybe if you had a decent bed you could sleep for more than half an hour at a time."

"No time for sleep. This monster's going to hit again tonight, Dean. How many more people will die before we figure it out, huh? No. Sleep isn't important."

Wrong. Dean knew better than to approach that subject, the way Sam knew better than to openly talk about Hellhounds scheduled to arrive right in time for the kid's damned birthday. He tried not to grimace at the thought. Okay, so maybe there was a regret in him somewhere.

"Humor me," Dean said. "I don't like the way this place smells."

He was all set to hear a long diatribe about the countless places they'd stayed which were far worse, but it never came. Instead, Sam nodded, retrieved his duffel and began rolling his clothes into a ball. At this stage in the game, Dean figured it was best not to wonder why and go with the flow. Besides, he knew why Sam didn't bicker quite as much when Dean wanted something. He smiled sadly. He'd get Sam all set up someplace decent, then give Tara a call.

Everything was going exactly the way he wanted. Dean closed the folder on the images of crime scene photos depicting various bloody body parts, no closer to figuring out where their monster was than Sam had been. He was sure they'd find it before it found them, though.

* * *

><p>His lungs burned and his hamstrings felt like they'd been stretched too far to ever regain their original shape. He couldn't stop, no matter what. To his right and slightly behind, Dean sprinted for all he was worth, but the barest of glances showed Sam his brother was tiring as quickly as he was. Frankly, he didn't know why they were running so hard. They weren't going to get away this time.<p>

"Why the hell haven't we exploded into a million handsome pieces already?" Dean huffed and puffed between steps.

There was only one reason Sam could think of. The witch wanted them to run, was amused by their futile attempts to flee. It was waiting for the right moment. None of the other victims had been eviscerated or mauled. He could almost feel hot breath against his neck, which was ridiculous. All in his head. Part of him wondered if the whole supernatural world knew about Dean's deal, and this was some cheap magic trick to call up the idea of Hellhounds. He'd seen the horrible, sick look on Dean's face at the first growl. Think, think. Sam had to think of a way to make this bastard get dead.

"Shut up and run," Sam said, as he slipped on something and nearly took a header.

The witch or warlock or whatever it was called was so much more powerful than Sam had anticipated. He had screwed the pooch on this one and now they were both going to die. As he ran, he wondered if there was some clause in a crossroads demon deal that prohibited an early death by means other than actual, bona fide Hellhounds. Had to be. He'd take comfort in knowing he was the only one bound to die tonight, except Dean was going to die anyway, only with Sam gone he'd be all alone when it happened. There wasn't time to call Bobby, make sure someone knew his dying wish was for Dean to not be by himself at the end.

All the mental fatalism reminded him he had a job to do, a brother to save the way Dean had saved him time and again their whole lives. He had to think. He couldn't do that while running through dank, garbage-filled alleyways. Think, think. His foot caught the edge of a wet pool and he slipped again. This time he couldn't recover, landed on his ass. His teeth rattled at the impact and he clamped down on his tongue, hard. _This is it_, Sam thought, _I'm dead right here_. The wet oozy stuff he'd fallen in seeped into his jeans. He didn't think it was water, didn't think he wanted to know what else it might be. He flopped a bit, like his top and bottom halves were out of sync. For half a second, he thought maybe he'd seriously injured himself, expected to feel a whitehot pain rip through him. Like before. Less than a year ago, he'd died in mud and water. He must be fated to always go out that way. Better that than being eaten by Hellhounds.

"Sam," Dean said, more of a wheeze than a word.

Shit, oh shit. Sam thought he might have said that last bit out loud. What kind of dick move was it to make it about him, anyway? Sam felt a strong hand under his left arm, wanted to help it pull him upright. He couldn't seem to manage, which was about as wrong as his assessment of the situation had been. He was useless. He couldn't fix anything. He couldn't do anything right, no matter how much he wanted to.

"In here. Come on, get up." Dean oofed into his left ear and tugged at him again. "Sam."

Sam blinked. There was an open door, there as if by magic. Magic. Damn it. Think, he had to think. He knew he and Dean both knew there wasn't much use in hiding, but maybe if they could get a break from running one of them could come up with a way out of the mess before they became mystery piles of ooze in a damned seedy alley. Or warehouse. Blown to smithereens, nearly unrecognizable as human. He had a horrible thought about what he'd fallen in. He got his legs and arms to cooperate at last, half crawled through the door with Dean hovering right behind.

The building appeared to be empty, at least for business. Sam gathered his wits, surveyed their new location. Boxes piled. Light coming from somewhere. The stink of unwashed bodies, urine and booze. Unfunded homeless shelter. They couldn't stay here if there were people living inside. Too much danger. No one else deserved to get hurt because of how stupid he was for plunging ahead on this hunt without accurate information.

"You okay, Sammy?" Dean asked, breathing still accelerated from the run. "You looked out of it for a minute there."

Sam realized he tasted blood. He spat, a glob of red-tinged saliva hitting the warehouse floor. It sounded loud. Somewhere to the right, a man's voice muttered something too low to hear.

"Dean," Sam said. "We can't stay."

"I know, I smelled 'em before I heard 'em. Just thought we could catch our breath for a while." Dean stared at him. "You didn't answer me. You okay?"

Not really, but Dean didn't mean long term. He only meant the physical here and now.

"I'm fine."

"Well, not for long. We're screwed here, Sam," Dean said. "Even if this shithole smells ripe enough to throw our scent, it won't last."

"Hey," that indistinct voice from before shouted and was understandable, if slurred. "Who asked ya? Get outta my house, asshole!"

"Yeah, yeah, get your panties out of a bunch," Dean shouted. He pursed his lips, then tilted his head. "You hear that?"

"Hear what?" Sam asked. Then it clicked. "It's too quiet out there. Those things were right behind us."

Neither of them were naïve enough to believe ducking into a warehouse was enough to _actually_ lose the trail of a witch-controlled pack of dogs. More than that, a group of animals like that running loose on the city streets would have brought the attention of cops, or animal control. Fire department. Anything, yet there were no sirens, no indication anyone or anything was out there. The only sounds Sam could hear was him and Dean breathing and one of the residents of the warehouse apparently taking a very loud and powerful piss.

"Something isn't right." Dean checked his weapon, then checked it again. "Like, for one thing, I don't get why it didn't blow us up the second it knew we were onto it."

"You know witches aren't exactly known for following anyone's rules but their own."

Sam ignored the strange look that crossed Dean's face at that remark and inched toward the door. Before he'd fallen, he would have sworn he felt the nip of teeth on his jeans, the hot breath of an angry canine pack. He eased the door open an inch and peered out. There was nothing. No sounds, no smells. Nothing. It didn't even look like an alley. It didn't look like anything, like the warehouse had been draped with a black blanket.

"Uh, Dean," he said.

"What in the hell is that?"

"I dunno."

But he had an idea. Sam's lower back developed a strong twinge. The fall had been real, he had hit the ground. But he was starting to wonder how much else had been, and for how long it maybe hadn't been. How much was real, not had been. His tongue throbbed where he'd bit it. Real. He turned to the interior of the warehouse, expected it to be gone and replaced with the black nothingness. The stench of piss remained, so did the faint movements of transients dwelling in the shadows. There were walls and windows. He didn't know if he was relieved or not. Probably not. Probably didn't matter either way. He had a bad feeling. He couldn't sort everything into neat real and not real columns.

"The son of a bitch is messing with us." Dean's anger was below the surface, but very much there. They were both on the same page. "There never was any …"

Hounds, Sam completed the thought in his head when Dean couldn't say the word out loud. Sam wasn't sure where reality had begun to turn into fantasy, which was terrifying. The more he thought about it, the more confused he got. Them holing up to mount some kind of defense was worthless, because even if this all looked solid, at any moment it might not be real and they wouldn't figure it out until it was too late. He didn't remember ever getting to the warehouse district, only running through it, which hadn't been happening at all. So, if hadn't happened, it was a pretty fair bet it still wasn't happening. Their only choices were to stay where it seemed genuine or go back out to what they knew for sure wasn't. They were so completely screwed. And it was his fault.

"No," Sam said, "there wasn't."

He squinted into the darkest corners of the expansive room, looked for visual confirmation of the smells and sounds. There was no solid black curtain smothering them inside, the way it hung outside, but that might mean nothing at all. His head spun.

"I said get out," that bodiless voice shouted again. Louder, closer. "Get out now."

Sam would feel so much better if he could put a face to that voice. He felt like it was coming from everywhere. Couple that with not even knowing if it was a figment of his imagination made it all the eerier.

"I wish that guy would shut his cakehole," Dean muttered.

"Dean, I don't think …" What was he going to say, that he thought that angry drunk was all in their heads? It was ridiculous. "I'm not sure there's anyone … what if none of this has been real?"

Dean looked a little pasty in the dim light, as he stared tight-lipped at Sam, and Sam thought maybe he was more scared than angry. He couldn't blame Dean; he was feeling the same way. Sam tried to remember something he could be one hundred percent certain about. It was surprisingly difficult. He thought it had something to do with Dean telling him he'd do nobody any good if he burned himself out. Damn. He guessed Dean was right about that.

"_We're_ real, though," Dean said. "You and me. Right?"

The question threw him, big time. Sam felt his palms get clammy and the hair on the back of his neck stand up. He was real. But he didn't know if Dean was. He stared at his brother, the face so familiar to him he could picture it exactly with his eyes shut. He was just about sure Dean was actually standing there and not some sort of projection and then he got punched in the arm, hard.

"Ow, hey. What the hell, Dean?" Sam said.

"We're real." Dean looked at him with a grin that almost covered the alarm. Almost. "If nothing else is, at least we are."

Sam nodded and pretended that Dean punching him was proof enough of their mutual existence. It had to be. He didn't want to consider that he was alone. Not yet. He wasn't ready for that.

"Come on, Princess, what do you say we start fighting instead of running?"

Sam couldn't argue that. The idea, anyway.

"I could kick some witch ass right about now."

The problem was they didn't know for sure it was a witch. They didn't know what had been done to them, or if it was still happening. It could be one of many things. They could be experiencing a joint hallucination. They could be in a shared dream again. Maybe they'd been slipped something; that was easy enough to do. Sam had no idea, because he'd had no idea what this guy was truly capable of. They couldn't fight the unknown, and Dean knew it too. Sam frowned. Think, think. He was going in mental circles.

A scraping sound behind them, like metal across concrete, made them both jump and turn toward it. Their reflexes, fast enough on a normal day, were too slow. Coming at them like a dervish was a vaguely man-shaped creature. Immediately, the image of the Tasmanian Devil popped into Sam's brain, and suddenly that was what it was coming straight for him. _Not real, not real_, he thought. He didn't know what Dean saw but guessed demon, only because he started spouting Latin.

"It's not real," Sam shouted and pulled his gun. "Dean."

The cartoonish Tasmanian Devil spat at him and devoted its attention to Dean. It happened too fast. Sam felt like he was wrapped in that black blanket they'd seen outside, wondered if it was possible he was. The thing put its hand on Dean's forehead, with a resounding slap. Sam choked on the smell of sweat and piss and yesterday's booze. His ears rang with the sound of Dean whimpering, the sound so foreign he didn't know if it was really happening, what was being done.

"I told you to _get out_," the thing said and shoved Dean. "Hunters, go where you won't bother me."

Reacting, Sam grabbed for Dean's arm and wrapped his fingers around a sleeve. The momentum pulled him forward instead of stopping Dean. Somehow, impossibly, they were on a walkway, falling over the guardrail into empty space. The witch, warlock, whatever waved his hands at them, his lips moved. Sam couldn't hear what was said, he could only hear Dean's distress. It seemed like they fell forever, but he knew that wasn't right. He knew they might not even be falling at all. He twisted midair anyway, tried to put himself on the bottom, in case they'd eventually impact the ground. Dean didn't fight, just made that awful sound, like a child waking from a bad dream. He didn't have time to tell Dean it would be okay, or wish Dean would tell him that.

Because it wasn't okay.

Above, he saw what looked like shooting stars. White fireworks. It was amazing and terrifying simultaneously, surreally beautiful. Cold air whipped his hair every way. Everything melded together, the bursts of light, Dean's cries, the sensation of falling and floating. Then, Sam knew only pain. His body slammed into the ground, expelled the air from his lungs. Dean landed on top of him, an elbow jabbed into his gut, forehead hit his teeth. Sam's shoulders bounced off concrete and, as abruptly as that, he bounced out of consciousness.

* * *

><p>When Sam finally woke up, Dean was already gone. Neither of them knew that right away.<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"Sam … Sam. Come on, man."

Everything shook then, his whole body. With the jarring muscles came acute awareness that everything hurt. Every bone felt bruised, every muscle pulped. It was never good to wake up to pain like that, and as Sam lay as still as possible taking a confused, shaky inventory of all the aches, he also tried to remember how he'd ended up feeling like he should be in traction. Dean would tell him.

"'M up," he said, an automatic response. Dean sounded worried and winded and probably felt as bad as he did, as whatever had happened must have happened to them both. "I'm fine."

He wasn't fine. Saying so was also automatic. He opened his eyes and found his brother's face above his, fuzzy. Out of focus. He blinked and saw a little more clearly. Behind Dean, there was a beam of sunlight filled with dust motes. Big room. He couldn't remember how he … no, apparently they, judging by the bloody gash on Dean's forehead Sam could see despite his vision swimming ever so slightly, had ended up there, and both injured. He was sure it would come to him eventually. Wherever they were, it didn't smell clean. The smell of chemicals in the air was a note second only to dust, and there was something even beyond that. The images solidified enough for him to recognize at last. They were in a warehouse. That was vaguely familiar.

"I thought you weren't ever going to wake up," Dean said. "You don't look fine. I can tell you don't feel fine. Sammy, I don't think anything's fine here."

Sam squinted. Now Dean sounded weird; he couldn't pinpoint exactly how beyond the repeated use of the word fine, which was annoying. It was like Dean was younger, somehow. He shook his head. That was stupid. He could see Dean and Dean looked like the same old Dean. He imagined if he'd woken first, found Dean and couldn't make him open his eyes. He furrowed his eyebrows, hated that he couldn't remember what had happened. Sam thought he must have banged his head, that was why he'd been out. He sat slowly, ignored the aches and pains as best he could, felt the back of his head for a lump. There wasn't one. A good sign, though it didn't mean much. He wished he could shake the cobwebs out, but knew he couldn't force it.

Dean scratched at his forehead, then looked at his fingers closely and rubbed them against his jean leg before he lifted them to scratch again.

"I'm okay," Sam said, specifically avoided the word fine. "How are you doing?"

He thought Dean must be the one concussed. Sam noticed what his brother was scratching at was a laceration that didn't look too bad, didn't need stitching, but there was a sizeable bruise already popping to the surface. He studied Dean, forgot his own discomfort for the moment. Dean's eyes were bright, but he appeared agitated. Nervous. He supposed he'd feel the same way if he could get it together. Concussion or no, he was going to have to keep an eye on Dean.

"I'm not fine, either," Dean snapped. "Don't you know what's going on?"

Frankly, no, Sam didn't know, but he was reassured that his brother seemed to. He grabbed for Dean's arm, to stabilize himself as he pulled himself upright, as well as to hopefully calm Dean down. It worked on both counts. In a second, he was on his unsteady feet and Dean stood next to him, only fidgeting a little. His first good look around the warehouse left him more confused than ever. It seemed right, but at the same time he thought it was wrong and a moment after that he had no idea what he was thinking. Until he blinked and everything seemed to flood into his head. Him and Dean running from invisible threats, reality being warped right in front of them, the magic he'd been stupid enough to underestimate, falling as if into an abyss.

"Yeah. Yeah, I know," Sam said, though he wasn't a hundred percent yet. He didn't think they'd actually fallen anywhere but down in their tracks. "I think."

The warehouse looked different. It was daylight, for starters, and he was sure they'd been running through fake alleyways at night. Of course, since that hadn't been real and there'd been that weird cloak of darkness surrounding the warehouse (which he presumed had been real, since they were still in it), so he couldn't be sure of what was true yet. The booze and urine odor was gone. Even if this was all a mirage, he was glad for that. He'd learned to take the small victories for what they were. He didn't think his stomach could have taken another minute. As the fuzziness faded from his brain, a prickle of paranoia replaced it, the reminder that anything could happen at any time.

"Well, the demon's long gone by now. We should get out before all hell breaks loose," Dean said. "Regroup and come up with a new game plan."

That worked for Sam. He nodded and took a step toward the door, instead ended up facing a wall that was lined with stacked barrels, some of them distended and rusty, and he realized that was where the chemical smell came from. He heard a faint crackling noise, and figured out what else he'd smelled since waking. Smoke. He looked up, half expecting to see flames. He wasn't sure if it was part of the weird mind games the witch was playing or not, but didn't want to stick around to find out either way. He spotted an exit sign.

"This way," Sam said as he started for it on shaky legs. He willed the weakness away. He didn't like the idea of being anywhere near a fire if there were chemicals involved. Well, or regular old fire, either. It was too much like imagining Dean in the Pit, too much of a reminder of Jess, of Mom. "Come on."

"Right behind you."

Sam heard the approach of sirens, and a lot of them. An engine bearing the number 36 nearly ran Dean over as they stumbled out of the building. Dean didn't seem to notice as Sam pulled him back and nearly suffered a heart attack. The engine wasn't moving fast, but something that size didn't have to move fast to flatten a person. From the corner of his eye, he saw smoke streaming from the top floor of the big building. Turning his attention upward made him aware the warehouse must have housed offices or something at one point. He didn't remember that from before, but before might not have happened. The building appeared disused. He returned his gaze to street level. He noticed at least one of the fire crew spot them and cursed under his breath.

"Damn thing was trying to burn us alive. Now I really want to gank that son of a bitch," Dean said. Then after a pause, "I always wanted to be a firefighter. 'Member that, Sammy?"

"Yeah. Sure." He was pretty sure Dean had wanted to be a firefighter only until he was four, which Sam wouldn't remember. Now wasn't the time for trips down memory lane, his or Dean's. Sam tugged at Dean's arm. They had to get away from here. He knew how it must look, them running out of a burning warehouse. He had no desire to be held for questioning. "Let's go."

"It wouldn't kill us to watch for a few minutes."

Actually, it might. Sam wasn't sure yet if this was happening, so either they'd be walking right back into the witch's territory or they'd be hauled in to a police station for questioning. He didn't like either option, and pretended that walking away might also put them back in the witch's territory. A dull ache was forming at the base of his skull, another above his right eye. It reminded him of the pain that came with the visions, and he had a crazy thought that maybe they'd come back after all this time. He closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose, and when he opened them again noted a firefighter with a white stripe on his helmet walking toward them.

"No, Dean, you said it yourself. We need to regroup," Sam said, frustrated by Dean's about face. "Come on. We have to go."

If he could only remember where they parked. That, like so much, seemed a bit scrambled. Sam picked a direction and went with it. They'd get away from suspicious eyes first, then find the car. He trotted as fast as he could, a prickling sensation of being watched at the back of his neck, right where the headache was throbbing. He couldn't imagine any of the fighters could leave their post to chase them down. At about two blocks away, he glanced over his shoulder to confirm they were being left alone. That was when he realized he was the only one running. Dean was nowhere to be seen. Normally, he was way more in tune with his brother – Dean wasn't the only protective one; they watched each other's backs. He shook his head, regretted it when all it earned him was stabbing pain.

"Damn it."

He ran a hand through his hair and started back. At least he knew where Dean had gone, though why was perplexing. Dean knew better than to draw the attention of the authorities. Sam was starting to wonder just how hard Dean had knocked his head. The importance of getting them both somewhere they could take stock was pressing on Sam just as surely as whatever was pressing on a nerve at the base of his head, because there was no way Dean would do something this stupid without being compromised in some way. It just wasn't possible.

He approached the scene of the fire with caution, stuck close to building walls. If Dean was already compromised, it wouldn't do any good to get caught himself. Sam was surprised at how he could feel the heat of the fire from half a block down the alleyway, and when he poked his head round the corner, his face warmed. There were more engines already, men ran back and forth and news vans were approaching. Old-looking news vans, he noticed with a frown, and then he noticed the engines themselves looked shiny and new, but old at the same time. He frowned.

Sam didn't have time to think too much about it, as he caught sight of his brother next to a firefighter. This one had a white stripe on his helmet like the other guy had, but was obviously not the same guy – this one had a few inches on Dean. The guy was staring with a look of horror on his face, and Sam could only guess what that meant. He assumed it had to do with the fire, as he watched the man take off, shouting into a clunky radio about evacuation and volatile contaminants. He wasn't who Sam needed to keep track of, though, and so he turned his attention to Dean, who stood there looking awed and proud. Everyone was too busy to pay them any mind, which was a blessing he wasn't about to take for granted. He darted forward, to his brother's side.

"Dean, what the hell are you doing?" Sam said.

"I thought they oughta know about the possible toxic chemicals stored in there sooner rather than later."

Dean shrugged, the way he did whenever he did something most people would call heroic but he'd call no big deal. Sam doubted Dean even knew how self-effacing he was about the truly important stuff, or how Sam saw him for how he really was; it was no coincidence he'd spent the better part of his first twelve years on Earth idolizing his big brother. The explanation for Dean traipsing back into the literal hot zone went a long way to appease Sam, but instinct still had him itching to go.

"Good thinking." Sam wanted to say more, like how Dean had probably saved lives and just by doing something that hadn't occurred to him at all. He could never come up with a way to say those things without it turning into a schmaltzfest and Dean hated that crap. It wouldn't matter, and made him acutely re-aware of their differences, changes he felt were growing ever since he … came back. He clapped Dean on the shoulder. "Can we go now?"

"Yeah, we should do that," Dean said. "What're we standing around here for anyway?"

Sam now knew why his head ached. Dean had turned into a human pendulum as far as he could tell. That coupled with having zero recovery time, of course, which brought him back to the need to get somewhere secure. This time he let Dean lead. He didn't need to have another unplanned detour and it was just easier. Maybe his brother knew where the car was, since he was the one who shared a special, semi-unhealthy bond with it.

They hadn't made it a block when a large blast sounded, the barrels stored in the warehouse apparently igniting or becoming overheated. From a distance, Sam's instinct was still to stop, turn and flinch. He hoped like hell no one had been hurt, and was glad he and Dean had woken up when they did. Assuming this was happening, that was. He was starting to believe it was, that the witch had somehow dumped them in a warehouse guaranteed to explode and ditched them. Made a certain amount of sense.

"Jesus," Dean said, "we could have been in there."

"I think we're going to need help with this one," Sam said.

"Let's just get back to the hotel, then we can call Bobby. Jefferson, maybe. He's closer."

Sam nodded. Given the situation, that was as good a plan as any. Unfortunately, it took him all of five more minutes to realize something was wrong. Something _else_ was wrong.

"Sammy, I have no idea where the car is." Dean halted and turned around in a circle, as if that would do any good. "I don't even know where the hell we are. Do you remember getting here? Before, I remember dogs. And fire."

"Well, the fire just happened."

"No, before. It happened before. With the fire demon."

There hadn't been a fire demon. Sam was almost sure of that.

"Dean, we're dealing with black magic," Sam said, "not a demon."

Dean blinked at him a few times, then nodded. Sam wasn't sure what that meant, exactly, but the persistent headache made him not want to think too much about it. If he was plagued with pain, Dean might have gotten a little jumbled when the witch … the witch clamped its hand on his brother's forehead. Sam's uneasiness grew, his heart started to pound, which only made his head pulse right in time with every beat. God, he just wanted an aspirin at this point.

"Right. Of course," Dean said. He squinted down the street. "Wait, there she is."

Relief flooded through Sam as they headed for the black Impala parked somewhat askew down the street. That feeling was short lived. The closer they got, the more he suspected it wasn't their car after all. And Dean's steps slowed, too, giving him some confirmation. This car had a black interior. Wrong license plates, a solid blue with yellow letters. His eyebrows rose when he saw the tabs.

"Uh, Dean?"

Sam glanced at the other cars parked along the street and remembered that vague feeling of wrongness from earlier, back with the fire engines looking new but old. Every car parked along the street was a model he'd typically only seen at car shows Dean dragged him to sometimes. All of them had tabs set to expire sometime … in 1975 or 1976. Now his headache had a side of stomach upset, the dots connecting just fine.

"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore," Sam said.

"We weren't _in_ Kansas," Dean said with utter sincerity.

Which did nothing at all to make Sam feel better.

* * *

><p>Dean had started to believe Sam wasn't all right, though he seemed to be moving fine and was his regular grouchy self. By the looks Sam kept shooting him, he had the same thoughts about him. One of them should be worried. Him. Sam. No. Him. Sam had been out of it for a long while back there. So, he should be worried and Sam shouldn't. That made a whole lot of sense to him.<p>

Except everything around Dean was like one of those old window shades, cracked along the edges. Sometimes a tug would only make it jerk up a little, and sometimes a tug had the thing roll up to the top and spin with a _thwapthwapthwapthwap_. It was mostly _thwapthwapthwap_ at the moment, and he knew it but couldn't stop it. He couldn't keep anything straight. Maybe his brain was more like eggs, scrambled up instead of whole. The ground was solid, the ground was quaking. Sam made sense, Sam spouted gibberish. There was fire, there was fire. That part stuck. He thought the stench of smoke had burned into his nose. He could still smell it, therefore it had happened.

"Aren't you seeing this? Look at the plates, Dean."

_Thwapthwapthwap_.

He automatically did as ordered and it finally became clear. Sam hadn't meant the Kansas thing literally, and they were in more trouble than either of them had realized. Dean frowned. He had no idea how a fire demon could make them go backwards in time. This was LA. It made more sense to him that they'd somehow stumbled onto a movie set or location shoot. He scanned left and right, seeking a crew and pondering the idea of becoming a PA again just for the food. He was hungry. He had a craving for eggs and didn't know why.

"Oh," he said. "Huh."

"All you have to say is huh." Sam paced a few steps, a tight little line, and his body language screamed tension. "We got magicked back to fucking 1975, and you can't muster up anything but a huh. Dean, I think there's something wrong with you."

It wasn't real. Dean didn't know why Sammy was so upset about it. Hell, as far as he was concerned, while they were on set or whatever it meant he was surrounded by classic cars and there wasn't anything to complain about there. It looked like the budget for the flick was large; this place didn't even look like LA today. It wasn't as smoggy. The cars looked lived in, used daily. Dean didn't think that was right. He didn't remember hooking up with Tara Benchley, but he remembered wanting to, so he must have and this must be her movie. _Thwapthwap_. There was a logical explanation for everything. He wished he remembered the sex, though since he didn't, he'd just have to have more. Logic was amazing.

"I don't think there's any reason to get worked up over this." Someone had to keep his head on straight. Sam could get hysterical, but Dean wasn't going to. "Just relax for once in your life. It's not like it's the first time we've been in this situation."

It was almost funny, the way Sam's eyes bugged out. Except that _thwapthwap_ again, and Dean started getting worked up himself. Sympathy hysterics. He always did get upset when Sam did, not that he showed it on the outside the way Sam always got all waterworky. He frowned. The firemen had hoses and water and foam. The whole movie thing didn't explain the fire. The fire was real. The men fighting it were real. He'd swear the guy he talked to about barrels of something had been legitimately concerned, not acting. Dean had woken up and there was fire and there was a demon and there was Sam. Those things were right. And now he didn't know if anything else was.

"Yeah, Dean, it is," Sam said. "I know for damn sure I've never been in 1975 before. It's temporally impossible, I think. We shouldn't be here now."

Sam kept on muttering about time and space and warlocks, but Dean only halfway paid attention to the words. It was just that his brother had started to remind him of someone from the movies. Good ol' Doc Brown. If Sam's hair were white, he might look a little like Doc Brown. Dean smiled, then started to chuckle softly. Maybe if he asked real nice, Sam would say flux capacitor. Strong hands clasped his shoulders and spun him until he was looking at Sam's perplexed face. He tried to stop laughing, he honestly did. It wasn't funny. He knew it. Sam gave him a hundred non-verbal cues about how not funny it was. He wanted to stop, for his brother. Everything was for Sam.

"Dean," Sam said. "I need you to focus. Stay with me."

Focus, yes. He could do that. All he had to do was stick to the things he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt were true. Sam. Fire. Demons. Sam, the most out of the three. Dean discovered that he really was clear if he kept himself tuned in to his brother. Maybe that was messed up, maybe it wasn't. Maybe he didn't care. The shade in his brain stayed put, no thwapping, and he began to process.

"You think we're really here, that it's no illusion," Dean said.

Sam didn't answer, continued to look at him for a long moment. Dean knew what that was. Dad had done it too, and seeing Sam weigh and measure him the exact same way was uncanny. Sam was so like Dad, but there was a certain clinical quality to his brother these days, that kind of imprecise precision that set him on edge despite trusting no one like he trusted Sam. Finally, Sam relaxed and nodded.

"I think the last time we even had a doubt, we could see that curtain thing. No curtain in sight," he said.

"No film crew either." Dean took another look around, just in case. "Or whatever."

"I hadn't thought of that, actually. There has to be a way to find out for sure." Sam glanced around, then hit Dean on the arm with the back of his hand. "There. Newspaper dispenser."

They scurried over to the machine like frightened rabbits, and were met with confirmation neither of them really needed. The date on the display paper read March 20, 1975. In the distance, the sounds of the fire being fought, the shouts of tinny voices through megaphones, made a strange soundtrack. The fire was real, Dean remembered. The newspaper was real. This was all real. Holy balls.

"Shit, we are fucking screwed," he said.

"Took the words right out of my mouth," Sam said. "Dean, this is my fault. We were in way over our heads because I misjudged the guy's control of magic, and now we're stuck in the dark ages."

"It wasn't your fault, Sam. I was right there with you."

Sam snorted and didn't look reassured. That had to stop. There was no room for Sam Winchester's bleeding guilty heart here.

"I mean it," Dean said. "Let's just get ourselves out of this. It doesn't matter whose fault it is. Anyway, _you_ didn't transport us back in time."

"_Hunters, go where you won't bother me."_

The fire demon's voice rang so loud in his memory, Dean startled a bit and looked to see if the thing was standing right behind him. There was no one there but him and Sam, and a few down and outers who were heading toward the fire to gawk or check on buddies. Most of the buildings looked shoddy, old and were probably vacant. That was useful, actually, because he had a feeling he and Sam were going to be squatting until they could get the hell back to the future.

"You're right."

"Of course I am." But Dean didn't know fire demons could time travel. Maybe it hadn't. Maybe the fire demon was here when they got here. That made sense. _Thwapthwap _went the shade in his head. "I'm the oldest, I'm always right."

He grinned as Sam rolled his eyes. Something inside him eased. They might be royally screwed at the moment, but they were together. Right now in his life, that mattered most. He only had a couple of months left. Dean lost the grin, the echo of Hellhounds baying sounding in his head at the reminder of his short time left on the planet. He wondered if the hounds would come for him if they were stuck here indefinitely. He shuddered. He might die before he was born.

"Dean?" Sam asked, shaking his shoulder.

"Hmm?"

"I said, we should find somewhere to hole up, figure things out. I don't think we should try our luck with credit cards."

"Yeah, I thought of that." Which wasn't strictly true. He hadn't thought of the money situation, just that they couldn't mess with the space time dilation or whatever by making contact with a lot of people. "Luckily, it looks like we're in the area for five star accommodations."

"Yes, lucky. That's what we are. We'll probably get lice."

If they stayed in the vicinity, then Dean thought they would have an easier time finding and fighting the demon. They'd be at an advantage by staying on the thing's turf and blending in to the homeless population. He knew how much Sam hated to be away from his razor and loofah (oh, hell, so he was the loofah user), but if their lives had taught them anything, it was that making do was essential. He wished he remembered a time before their Dad became so … resourceful.

He wondered what Dad was like in 1975. Still in Nam? He couldn't remember. It wasn't something their father ever liked to talk about. Nothing existed prior to the fire. Fire. Demon. _Thwap_. If demons weren't that visible and common until the Gate opened in the next century, then maybe they weren't dealing with one now. He had a mental image of mutilated rabbits and blood. Bones. Witchery. It was from a movie, were they on a movie set? No, no, what. Sam was still talking, he had to concentrate on that.

"…dinner. We're thirty-three years behind schedule, one night to wrap our heads around this won't matter much," Sam said. "How much cash you got?"

Dean took a step closer to his brother. Stay close, he had to stay with Sam. Watch out for Sammy. He felt better almost immediately with his sleeve brushing against Sam's, thoughts gelled more. Money, money. They couldn't use it. He watched Sam figure that out when he took a twenty out of his pocket and look with dismay at the giant Andrew Jackson head on it. It might as well be Monopoly money. They'd have to come up with another way. Make do with what they had, which was nothing. Not even the car's glove compartment to raid for Snickers and beef jerky.

"Oh." Sam looked at him stupidly. "No cash either."

Once, when he was nine, Dean had stolen a pack of hot dogs and a box of macaroni and cheese – the good stuff, not the store brand – from a grocery store in whatever town they were in. He'd felt ashamed, but he'd also felt hungry and sometimes it was better to come up with a solution himself than ask Dad when Dad had a certain expression on his face. He had to think stealing a sandwich in 1975 was going to be easy enough, or they could dine and dash. He wasn't going to feel shame for doing what he had to do.

"We'll work it out. We're Winchesters," Dean said, as if those six words solved everything.

"It's what we do?" Sam finished the insinuation with a laugh. "You're like an after school special these days."

Dean let that insult slide, though he took the banter for what it was. Comfort. Stability. Familiarity in unfamiliar territory. They'd hash out the details in due time so they could get _back_ to their time. He didn't know where they were going, but as they walked pace for pace, Dean glanced back at the thick black smoke filling the sky several blocks away. The beginnings of an idea formed. Maybe they were going to have to fight fire with fire.

_Thwapthwapthwap_.


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Whoops, got distracted with cupcake making tonight! _

**Chapter Three**

Sam slammed the cover of the book in complete frustration. All the move got was a glare from every direction, a moderate dust explosion and one outright stereotypical librarian's shush. He was beyond caring about what people thought. He was almost beyond everything. He hated 1975, with all of its stupid lack of technology, no resources on the occult and the dearth of over-the-counter painkillers that actually put even a dent in a major headache. He didn't think it was too much to ask for a damn Exedrin Migraine. Or a Tylenol Extra Strength. He pinched the bridge of his nose, the only thing that worked, though on a very short-term basis. Life had become about the small victories.

It had been nearly four whole days, three separate libraries and he was no closer to finding a way home now than he had been while standing on a street corner in a state of confused shock. He couldn't even track down their witch, who apparently hadn't been housed in the LA area and even if he had been, probably wouldn't have the same level of skill and power three decades in the past. Sam worried at his lower lip, tugging at a flake of skin with his front teeth. If he kept it up, he'd draw blood. Knew it, and kept on gnawing. The longer they were stuck, the less time he had to get Dean out of his deal, which was something he had started to believe wasn't going to happen even in their regular time. When he thought of it this incredible sense of panic overcame him, so much that he had a hard time containing it around his brother. It was getting worse, because Dean was being … nerve-wracking in other ways these days.

"I don't know why you're wasting your effort on that stuff, Sam," Dean said. "I already told you what we're dealing with here. I also don't know why you had to bring me along. This place is worse than a morgue. "

More glares.

"Oh, relax." Dean spread his arms out and glared back. "I know what I'm talking about. I've been to a lot of morgues."

In honor of their current place in time, Dean had started growing a moustache and sideburns. Both were in baby stages, looked more like he'd just done a bad job shaving, which was altogether too possible considering they were squatting in warehouses and cleaning up in gas station bathrooms where and when they could. The people around them didn't look like extras on _Starsky & Hutch_, but Dean sure did. His brother had, down pat, that kind of dirtiness that always seemed pervasive on 1970s cop shows. All he needed was to lose the short haircut. As Dean said, get a greasy mop like Sam's. Dean's pornstache in progress plus his own unruly (it wasn't greasy) hair combined onto one person would make the lucky guy blend right in. Sam hoped to all that was holy that they wouldn't be here long enough for him to grow his own facial hair, or for Dean to ponytail up. Long story short was that Dean looked unbalanced at the kindest, and they _both _looked a little skeevy.

"Dean, cool it," Sam said softly and pulled by the sleeve one of his brother's arms down.

"It's your own fault for dragging me here."

The more troublesome thing to Sam was that Dean didn't just appear unbalanced because of the facial hair. The pit in his stomach wasn't reserved for thoughts of Dean being torn apart by Hellhounds. It was everything. He couldn't pinpoint exactly when he had realized that Dean wasn't one hundred percent Dean. Part of him lived in denial, always had, and that was a stubborn trait to lose and a difficult one to fight. In his head, he'd been denying that something had happened to Dean, but in his stomach he'd known. Oh, he had.

Sometimes Dean … went away. That was the only way Sam knew how to think about it, give it a definition. One moment, Dean was sharp and on point. The next, he might as well be from Mars, raving and ranting about fire and demons. It was getting worse and worse, if he were going to admit it fully to himself. Sam had spent nearly a full day concentrating on that problem to the detriment of his primary goal of bending time and space. He supposed it was still making things more difficult than they actually were, that niggling worry of what the witch had done to his brother back in the warehouse. The hand on the forehead, the mumbled words he now suspected had been more than just a time spell of some kind. It would explain why he was fine and Dean was gone.

"Of course it's my fault." Everything was. "Just settle for a while. I'm almost through."

"You said that four hours ago."

"It would go faster if you helped me."

Sam hated how he sounded like he was having a conversation with a five-year-old. That description wasn't too far off, really, considering how half the time he expected to look over to Dean shooting rubber bands or spitballs at people the way he'd done yesterday. Somewhere in all the confusion and worry of the past few days, he'd figured out that Dean was more himself, kind of, whenever they stayed close together. When he stuck with Dean, Dean was mostly okay. Functional, anyway. If he left Dean in the warehouse to go out to score dinner from a diner or corner store, he'd come back to barely understandable ramblings about fire and demons. Or, worse, he'd come back to find Dean gone off somewhere. That would have been no big deal, but they were in 1975 for one thing and for another, nothing was normal even less than nothing ever was. Distracted as he was, it might have taken him longer than usual for the dots to be connected, but he still connected them.

It all meant that as long as Dean stayed with him everywhere, they'd both be fine. Just fine.

That was what Sam tried to tell himself, though in his heart of hearts he knew even when with him now Dean was starting to splinter. He rubbed his forehead even though the pain stemmed from the back. Definitely tension, not migraine. As much as he knew it would do him a world of good to stop worrying, he couldn't. He didn't want … the last months of Dean's life couldn't be with him like this. He wanted his brother. He wanted to get out of 1975 and he wanted to devise a brilliant plan to save Dean. He'd sworn to do that, and that horrible feeling in his gut told him he wasn't going to be able to live with failure.

Unfortunately, today's attempt at research had been just that - failure. And, worse, he was starting to think there was no simple human way to accomplish time travel, let alone unscramble a brain. Frankly, he wasn't too sure the latter could be done, period. Sam frowned and squinted at the library clock, noted that there was only half an hour left before close. He looked at his watch next, seeking some kind of mental reminder of the time they were supposed to be in. It never did anything but make him vaguely sick, since his watch had stopped at 2:17 AM, presumably the time they'd been sent back. He wasn't sure why he kept looking at it, maybe some deep-rooted irrational belief that the next time he'd see the minute hand moving and they'd be home. Poof, like that. Because that was precisely how their lives went.

Sam decided he'd had about as much as he could take of research for the moment. He couldn't say he was hungry, he hadn't been for days, but he knew Dean was. Dean always was. They were exact opposites, pretty much always but more often lately. They'd find a bar, he'd try to hustle some pool. It'd be a damn miracle without cash and feeling like he did. He'd take any shot. He didn't know how many more stolen meals he could choke down, and if they were somehow stuck here for weeks, they needed to come up with a better plan than petty theft or dumpster diving. His stomach did a flip he couldn't ignore.

"Be right back," he said and made a break for the restroom.

Five minutes later, Sam was more certain than ever that food was the last thing he wanted to see or think about. He wished like hell he could trust Dean to handle himself for one night. He couldn't. He'd have to suck it up and deal with the headache and queasiness and frustration. It wasn't so much to ask, considering that Dean had shouldered so much of that for most of their lives. He splashed water on his face, rinsed his mouth out and headed back to his brother.

Only Dean was nowhere to be seen. Over half the other patrons had cleared out, so spotting his brother should have been easy. Sam started feeling anxious right away, which was ridiculous. He didn't think Dean was that far gone, except what if he was? He pulled his jacket off the chair it was draped on, tugging it on as he walked to the librarian's desk.

"Excuse me?" he said to get her attention.

The librarian gave him the stink eye, which she'd been doing all afternoon thanks to Dean. Her lips pressed into an unhappy line, then she said, "Yes, what can I do for you?"

"Did you happen to see the guy I was with leave?"

"Mister, I'm not a babysitter for you down-and-out hypes. I'm afraid I wasn't paying any attention."

Sam called bullshit on that. She hadn't taken her eyes off them very infrequently the whole time they were there. He glared at her, but left her alone. He didn't really need her confirmation. His newly-empty gut was telling him Dean was no longer in the building. With any luck, he'd be out at their borrowed car, waiting. Hah, luck. When he got out there, not only was Dean not at the car waiting, but the car was gone altogether. If Dean went all fire-demony in five minutes' time, things were deteriorating too fast. Not for the first time, Sam wanted to call Bobby for help and reassurance. Except even if he could find Bobby in 1975, Bobby wasn't hunter and knower of all things obscurely supernatural Bobby then. Now. Jesus, was it any wonder his head ached? Still, part of him wanted to call every Bob Singer in South Dakota on the off chance he'd hear something familiar in a much younger voice.

He had called one John Winchester in Lawrence, Kansas, though, when Dean had been sleeping once. Just to hear someone familiar, only John didn't sound like Dad and all it had gotten Sam was a lump in the throat so big he couldn't croak out "wrong number" before hanging up. He felt like he was alone here.

"Damn it, Dean," Sam muttered and ran a hand through his hair.

He had no real idea where Dean could have gone. So far, Sam hadn't been able to track the guy down before he made a reappearance back at their little corner of a disused warehouse halfway across town. If Dean were Dean, Sam could have figured a pattern. This scrambled version of Dean was a whole different kettle of fish. Still, he had some ideas. He didn't like those ideas, but they were there and getting more solid with each passing day. Well, one thing was sure, and that was he couldn't stand outside the library all evening. They were in a significantly different neighborhood to the one where they usually picked up a car for their daily excursions, so he didn't want to risk a hotwire. Too many witnesses, and the librarian would be sure to peg him for it. Shit, he'd probably accidentally boost her car.

It was going to be a hell of a long walk back, though. Maybe if he wasn't six foot five, dirty and rough-looking he might manage to hitch a ride somewhere closer. Maybe if he sat on the steps, Dean would snap back to himself, remember he'd ditched his brother at the public library and come back for him. At any rate, Sam could use a minute, so he sat without that expectation. He closed his eyes and leaned the side of his head against the handrail. He wouldn't stay long; he had a suspicion that the librarian would call the cops on him regardless if he'd done anything wrong or not.

After a bit, he remembered the loose change he had in his pocket. It was less likely anyone would notice money dropped in a bus till was minted in a different decade or century. He should have thought of that long ago. He didn't know the transit system, but there was a stop across the street which looked to have frequent pick-ups all going the direction he wanted to go. He grabbed the handrail and hauled himself upright. By the time he got to the warehouse, Dean could be there. He tried not to think about the trouble his brother could be getting himself into, those ideas he didn't want to have proven correct.

The bus turned out to be a great option, and the driver helpful about what connections to take and generally kind. Sam doubted he'd have received the same treatment in his own time, so he had to put a check on the virtual pro column, though he was still anti-70s. About ten minutes into the route, the bus slowed and pulled to the side of the street as far as it could. A faint trill of sirens drew close and loud as a small red truck, then an engine roared past them.

"I wonder if that damn firebug hit another one," the driver said, edging the bus back onto the road.

"Hmm?" Sam said.

"You know, the fires they think an arsonist is starting in abandoned warehouses." The driver laughed humorlessly.

"There's a suspected arsonist?" Sam was mostly thinking out loud. That idea he had about Dean was getting more and more alarming.

"You bet. Going on three weeks now, pretty regular. Getting more regular, apparently. Guess you're not big on watching the nightly news, eh, buddy?"

"Not lately." That was true for both now and then. World events somehow seemed less important given all he and Dean had gone through, were going through and were about to go through. Past, present, future. Funny, except not funny so much or even a little. "Haven't had a TV for a while."

"Fair enough. Anyway, it's a damn shame they haven't caught the guy yet," the driver said. "This here'll be where you need to get off for your transfer."

"Thanks, man, have a good night," Sam said.

He stepped off the bus, heard more sirens in the distance. The fire must be a big one, like the one that they'd witnessed when they first got here. Sam sat on a bench under the bus stop shelter, leaned his elbows on his knees and covered his face with his hands.

"Damn it, Dean," he said again, "I'd better be wrong about this."

* * *

><p>Flames shot out windows and trailed up the side of the building. Dean stood at the edge of the crowd. Unlike the gawkers that always arrived to watch the spectacle, the fire itself wasn't what pulled his interest. He searched the faces that made up the crowd for a telltale sign, and kept an eye on the firefighters too. He'd seen demons possessing firefighters before once, he swore it. Wasn't sure, wasn't clear. But one of these times, it was going to slip up and then he'd have it. He'd fix everything, and get them back home at the same time. Because he was pretty confident this wasn't home, or at least he didn't think so. Too many men with mutton chop sideburns. Sammy would … Sam. Where was Sam? He felt like there was a gaping hole in his memory suddenly, didn't know when he'd gotten to the fire. He bit down on the panic. No, no. Not important. He had to focus. Finding and getting rid of the demon was the only important thing.<p>

The atmosphere outward from the fire for at least half a block rippled from the heat waves, made it more difficult for him to know what was real. He wouldn't be able to tell … there. Eyes black as coal stared at him. One face, then another, and another. Holy shit, they were everywhere. Dean took a step back, bumped into the person next to him, who turned and sneered, oil slicks for eyes. He wasn't prepared for this many of them.

"_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus_," Dean said.

It got an instant reaction. The demonic son of a bitch didn't cringe or hiss or anything like that. It frowned at him and said, "You okay there, pally?"

Then the eyes were normal, slightly bloodshot white surrounding the iris. Dean knew that didn't mean much. Demons could turn on their eye special effects at will.

"_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus_," he started over, still with no outward sign it was making an impact. "_Omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio_."

This wasn't, something wasn't right and Dean knew it but he didn't know what it was. He kept reciting the exorcism, and all it seemed to get him was a small circle of demons surrounding him. They didn't attack. They looked … worried. Some of them seemed amused.

"Hey, back off," a deep voice shouted. "Give him some air."

Sam, Sammy, Sam. Maybe if they both recited the rite in tandem it would work on this many at once. No, no, didn't make sense. Dean saw his brother tower over those closest to him, his face orange from the fire's glow, eyes dark. Dark, not black, not a demon, Sam.

"What's wrong with that guy?" someone asked.

"He got a knock on the head earlier this week and he's been a bit off since. Sorry for the trouble."

"You want we should get one of them paramedics over here, maybe?"

"No," Sam barked. Then, more quietly, "No, it's okay. He's fine. I've got him."

Sam's hand was on his shoulder, steering him. Knock on the head? Dean didn't remember, but it seemed possible. Not fire, no demons. He knew that. Except he didn't. They were everywhere, too many for them.

"Sam, all of 'em are…"

Like the snap of fingers, Dean didn't know what he meant. Nothing was what he thought it was. Seconds ago there were demons everywhere. He'd seen them with his own two eyes. Now all he saw were people. Nosy people, half watching the destruction of an old building and the other half staring at him as if he were the demon. He shook his head, tried to think. Everything jumbled all together. Brain oatmeal. _Thwapthwap_. He remembered someone once told him confusion was one of the signs of a concussion. Just now, Sam said he'd hurt his head. He trusted Sam. That much he knew. If nothing else stayed focused around him, his brother always would.

"I was so sure," Dean said.

"I know you were. It's okay."

Sam squeezed his shoulder, and Dean felt better. Clearer. That was messed up, somehow. Dean glanced at his brother. In the dim light of dusk further compromised by smoke and water, Sam looked tired. Sam sounded tired. Both of those things would probably be true even without the smoke, and both felt like they might be Dean's fault. He wanted to apologize, didn't know if he should or if that would only make it worse.

People needed to stop rubbernecking at them. It didn't matter. Sam got them out of the area fast, the sound of men shouting and the fire crackling, sizzling as it fought being extinguished fading into the night. They didn't speak, but Sam didn't let go of him either. He felt like a puppy being tugged along the street when all it wanted to do was sit tight. He took a backwards look at the flames high in the sky, knowing as surely as he had to get away from there that he had to get closer. Any attempt he made to get out of Sam's grasp failed. He gave up after a while. Later, he'd go back later.

When they got to their little squatter's corner, Sam eased down onto the floor, pulled his legs up into an inverted V and rested his head on them. Dean stood, watched his brother from above. They'd been at the library. Sam had a headache, always had a headache.

"Sammy?" he said, and crouched next to his brother.

"Dean, I need to know." Sam's voice was low, almost too quiet to hear. "Did you start that fire?"

"No. No, of course not." The denial was out of Dean's mouth for all of a millisecond before the doubt crept into its place. "Why would you ask me that?"

The lighter in his jacket pocket felt heavy, the taste of smoke was dense at the back of his throat like it had been there for weeks.

* * *

><p>Static in his ears, slight vertigo feeling. He woke slowly, head fuzzy from sleep instead of the constant pain that had plagued him all week. For a second, he thought the pain was gone. It wasn't. For a second, he thought maybe he wasn't in 1975 after all. He opened his eyes, saw a rough warehouse ceiling and regretted that this was all real. He was alone. He knew it before he looked to where he'd last seen his brother. Not good. Sam shook out his stiff muscles and stood.<p>

"Dean?"

The answer Sam's yell got was from someone else squatting in the warehouse telling him to fuck off, not Dean. Déjà vu. He thought of the witch pretending to be a homeless bum before sending them packing. Part of him wished it would be the same, a magic button. Part was sick to his stomach for his carelessness, and what might happen as a result.

"Dean?" he shouted, louder, more out of habit and frustration than any real belief his brother was somewhere in the building.

He gathered up what few belongings he and Dean had between them that couldn't be worn and headed for the exit. He didn't know exactly where Dean had gone, but Sam now knew all he had to do was listen for the sound of sirens. He hoped this time Dean hadn't gotten too far away. They didn't need another close escape; last time it had almost taken Sam too long to track Dean down, and both of them too long to get out of a burning building. Somehow, Dean seemed physically stronger when he was so keyed up about the demons only he could see. Or maybe exhaustion and the chronic headache made Sam's own larger size irrelevant.

Sam couldn't pinpoint the exact moment it had become more about keeping Dean from flying apart at the seams than finding a way home. It could have been yesterday or last week or both of those. Time didn't matter anymore, really, which was an irony he didn't want to think about. He was sure there was no way out of this mess, no lead any more reasonable than a book of ramblings of a man and his theory of time travel and how it was done with giant magnets. It wasn't done with magnets, large or small ones; that was about the only definitive thing Sam knew about time travel outside of its human impossibility. He simply couldn't do it on his own, not before Dean's deal … but he held onto some hope that time was fluid, that it moved differently depending on where on the timeline a person was.

What would help was a hunter network. There had to be hunters in the 1970s, but he had no idea how to find them. Most of the people he knew in this life through Dad were too young or not in the game yet. He'd imagined tracking down Bobby or Pastor Jim about four hundred times, though he knew even if he could, he couldn't risk messing with that whole Grandfather Paradox thing he wasn't sure was real or not. Or maybe it was that he didn't want to find out that he and Dean contacting either of them now was why Bobby was in the life and Jim was dead.

None of that was the first thing on his mind anymore, though it simmered back there in the same spot his head ached from tension and fatigue. That seemed an appropriate place for it. The real problem now was that Sam was only one person. He had crashed, suddenly and soundly judging by the kink in his neck. He must have dropped, and without figuring out how to keep Dean, Dean. Short of chaining his brother to a post, he didn't know what to do. That was starting to be the only practical option. He knew Dean had started at least one warehouse fire, and that he was convinced it was the way back home. It didn't make any more sense than the guy talking about magnets, but sense wasn't in Dean's vocabulary at the moment.

One of scariest things to Sam in all of this was that he had no idea if by a stroke of nonexistent luck they got back home somehow that event would reset Dean's brain or if he'd spend precious weeks tracking that motherfucking witch down to get Dean back to himself. God help him, though, sometime along the way he'd started to wonder if it would be better for Dean to stay scrambled if Sam couldn't find a way to keep him out of Hell, if it would be easier that way. Every time that through cropped up, he hated himself for it. He knew deep down he didn't mean it, and that if it was the last thing he did, he was going to save his brother, not this scattered mess of a person.

He wished he didn't have to keep resolving himself to that. It was like the more he reiterated it the more it actually revealed how unsure he was.

When he got outside, Sam realized there were no sirens to follow yet. That was both good and bad. He might still be able to talk his brother back into himself and prevent the need for those sirens, provided he found Dean in time. He didn't want to consider the chances of him actually finding Dean first beyond knowing they weren't great. He knew better than anyone how resourceful his brother could be, a trait that didn't seem to be impacted at all by whatever had happened to his brain. Neither was Dean's stubbornness. Sam had a feeling it would keep escalating until Dean managed to kill a demon only he could see, and he was afraid what that would mean to some unsuspecting person.

Sam felt the cell phone in his pocket, heavy only because it was useless. All he could do was shout his brother down, only he couldn't do that at all, not without attracting the wrong kind of attention. He doubted Dean would pick a warehouse too close to their squat; he wasn't so far gone that he'd endanger Sam. Of course, Sam didn't actually know that. It was true when they were in close proximity to each other, but once Dean left his side, he would go where the imaginary demon was, which was close to the original fire they'd made their grand entrance to 1975 in. He oriented himself briefly, then took off at a trot in that direction. He hadn't made it far when he heard telltale sirens fill the air.

"Shit," he muttered.

If he could get there in time, he might be able to talk Dean down and get them out of the area before anyone knew they'd been there. After he had put two and two together, Sam started making it a habit to steal a newspaper along with food, and according to what he'd read the police and fire departments felt close to finding their arsonist. The guy they wanted wasn't Dean. They wouldn't know that. If they caught Dean anywhere near a burning building, they'd see the lighter, smell the gasoline and they'd lock him up and throw away the key, and if the actual arsonist was smart, he'd lay low. At least in jail Dean would be safe, another of those random thoughts Sam hated himself for thinking. It would just be so much easier to concentrate on finding a dark magic practitioner that wouldn't kill first, ask questions later, if he didn't have to worry about Dean.

He followed his nose rather than the sirens, a trace of smoke filling the air and reawakening his headache. Sam didn't beat the fire engine, saw the flashing red lights strobe against a nearby building wall and heard the rumble of it idling. He cursed again and rounded the corner cautiously. There was already a crowd gathering. He didn't see Dean amongst it, which meant his brother was probably still inside the building. He hoped that didn't mean Dean had found some poor guy and thought he was the demon. The possibility had him move fast.

The interior of the building was dark with smoke. Sam took a moment to take off his jacket, then his outer shirt. He wrapped the shirt around his nose and mouth, and put the jacket back on. His heart pounded, and he had to fight the natural urge to flee which was every bit as strong as his natural instinct to find his brother. Fire had such bad connotations to him, to them as a family. He thought it cruelly ironic that this version of Dean was so obsessed with it, thought maybe the witch had planted the idea in Dean's head as a nasty joke. Then, all of this was a nasty joke.

Sam tried to keep track of directions and the layout of the building as he searched. After what seemed like forever, he saw a shape ahead that could be a person. Maybe Dean, maybe not. Whoever it was, they needed to get out. He approached with some caution.

"Dean," he shouted, voice muffled and distorted by the roar of fire and crack of the building protesting the assault on its inner structures.

"Sam, what are you doing here?"

He turned toward Dean's voice and saw there were two shapes, one standing and one cowering on the floor. Shit. Sam rushed to Dean, grabbed his arm and cringed slightly at the wild-eyed stare he got in return. Dean had his blade out and by the looks of it had been about to flay the disheveled man at his feet. He switched his hold to Dean's wrist and gripped him tight.

"Go," Sam told the guy. "Get out of here. Back the way I came about twenty feet, then take a left. It should lead you out. Keep as low as you can."

The guy didn't hesitate, though his steps faltered from fear, drunkenness, smoke inhalation or all three. Sam watched him go for a second, his attention returning to Dean when his brother tensed as if he were about to go after the man.

"Sam, what are you doing? You're letting him get away," Dean said.

"He's just a man." Sam leaned close and tried to keep his voice soothing, calm. "There's no demon here, Dean."

"Yes, there… " Dean blinked, then coughed. His eyes looked bleary, but not as wild. "Isn't there?"

"We can talk about this later. Right now, we have to get out of here. The cops and fire department are outside."

"Well, good," Dean said. "This building's on fire."

Jesus, it was like there was a reset button in Dean's head, so that every time Sam was able to get his feet back on the proverbial ground, he was a blank slate when it came to reality. He let go of Dean's wrist.

"Put your blade away and follow me."

"All right, fine."

Sam didn't know how a fire could get so bad so fast. The warehouse sounded like it was groaning in agony, and though his ears rang with the rush of adrenaline making his heart pump the blood faster in his veins, he heard booms and thumps from behind and below. He also heard men shouting. He increased his pace, while maintaining his line on Dean, who stayed no more than three steps behind him despite pausing to cough more and more frequently.

"Dean, you okay, man?"

Dean nodded, but Sam wasn't convinced. It seemed they'd gone twice the twenty feet he knew it took to the turn which would get them out of danger. They didn't have time to mess around. Still, he unwrapped the shirt from his face and tossed it at his brother.

"Hold that over your nose and mouth," Sam instructed, though he shouldn't have had to.

He started to think he'd gotten them turned around, though he didn't know how would be possible. He thought of the other guy; if he'd given wrong exit directions, Sam may have killed the guy as surely as Dean had been about to. Only worse. His own chest felt tight. He raised his left arm, tucked his nose and mouth in the crook. He tried to control his fear, no easy task since now he could see flames as well as smoke. He did not want die seven years before he was born. He turned to check on Dean again, found him five feet back.

"Dean."

"The bastard's following us," Dean said, thumbing at nothing behind him. "Playing my own game against me."

"No one's there, man. We have to get ou …"

A tremendous crash drowned out his words. For a second, Sam felt intense weight on the back of his neck and head and shoulders. It pressed him down, into pain and the dark.


	4. Chapter 4

_A/N: Show day! Show day! Y'all, I haven't been so excited for SPN nights in years. Most of the States is almost done watching, but I have two more torturous hours to go. There is no point to this note, so I'll shut it and get to ficcing. _

**Chapter Four**

Dean didn't know how he ended up flat on his back. He blinked once, twice. All he could see was smoke, a glimpse of a strange orange glow peeking from it now and again. He didn't … he couldn't … he rolled around like a turtle stuck on its shell. He finally got flipped onto his right side, and right away saw Sam lying a few feet from him, unmoving, face white as paper. Oh shit oh shit, the demon had killed his brother. No, Sam wasn't dead. No, no. Dean wouldn't believe it without proof, like before. It wasn't like last year, it wasn't. He couldn't seem to move, though every muscle was tense and ready.

Large shapes, two of them, came out of the smoke. They had air masks on, were dressed like firefighters. He knew they weren't real firefighters, nope. Demons, there were demons everywhere. They only looked big, were normal man sized. Possessed humans. One of them pointed at Sam, and they both ran to him. He watched them kneel next to Sam, shake him to see if he'd respond. He didn't, as far as Dean could see. A whoosh of fresh flames, like a wall, shot up and cut off his already impaired line of sight. Panic coursed through him, a tidal wave of it so intense he gasped, inhaled a bunch of smoke for his trouble. Dean coughed weakly, body moving and reacting at last. Through the flickering fire one of the two demons leaning over Sam stiffened and half turned, then shook his head and continued talking to his buddy.

He had to move before it was too late. Sam couldn't defend himself. Dean scrabbled to his feet, listed to the left as he struggled to pull his knife from its holster, hands shaky. He looked at it, just to be sure he had it. It was _the_ knife. Ruby's special, convenient demon killer. He didn't remember having it before, except he had it now so he must have always had it. He'd kill them all if they touched his brother. His head spun and spun, tried to catch up with itself and never could. Only one thing mattered, and that was saving Sam. The demons had his brother up, arms slung over each of their shoulders, his feet dragging. Away, away, they were taking Sam. He didn't think, only lunged through the flames, knife hand swinging.

The one closest to Dean reacted a millisecond before he reached them, shoved Sam and the other demon aside as if to take the full assault in some heroic sacrifice. Dean didn't give a damn what it looked like. Demons weren't heroes. He struck with the knife, satisfied to feel it meet some resistance, heard a thunk, felt the blade slide into flesh. He expected that weird internal lightning effect because it was the demon killing knife, but all that happened was the guy shouted in pain. Dean spared a glance at Sam's unmoving form, the other demon sprawled, also unmoving, halfway on top of him. Shouts, off to the side. He saw more demons, firefighters, demons rushing at them. Knife, he needed the knife. He scrabbled for the one he'd stabbed, didn't know how he ended up flat on the floor again.

Then the walls and ceiling shook, came down. A heavy chunk of something knocked against his ribs. The air rushed out of Dean's lungs. He lay there, tried to cough and choke and couldn't. The edges of his vision tunneled, winked out. Winked back on.

He opened his eyes and saw gray. Stone or steel, he didn't know. He had a chalky taste in his mouth, grit in his eyes, an elephant on his chest. Dean hacked up what felt like half of his left lung and only then remembered what had happened. Sam. Demons. Sam. He got to his hands and knees, squinted through dust and smoke to catch sight of his brother. Movement to his right, someone coughed. Two shapes in a heap about three feet from him. Sam, and the other demon.

"Sam," he said and coughed again.

Sam first, demons second. Dean inched his way to his brother, who didn't move or wheeze or anything. He felt better seeing Sam's chest moving up and down, a shallow, slight movement was good, it was good. He needed to get them out. Fire all around, no fire. Debris all around, trapped.

"_Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus. Omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio_," he said under his breath, feeling like he had done this all before and didn't need to.

The demon he'd knifed, leg, got 'em in the leg, groaned and clutched at his thigh. Dean stared at the masked face, couldn't see past fog. The other one, slumped across Sam's legs, had blood on its neck, completely out. He frowned. Demons took a lot of punishment before crapping out like that. His attention focused elsewhere, he almost didn't catch the other one making its way toward them. He snarled and shouted out more of the exorcism.

"Whoa, mister. Just take it easy," the demon said, voice hollow. It raised its hands, balanced on one knee with the other leg extended straight. "I'm a paramedic. I can help. I need to check on my partner, and yours."

"What you need to do is stay away from my brother," Dean said. "I'll take care of him."

The guy tilted to the side, grunted as if in pain. Dean wasn't going to fall for that. He ignored his own aches and pains, kept himself ready to spring to action in a blink. His fingers itched to grab the knife handle sticking out of the demon's leg, give the thing a good stick right in the eye. He didn't pick up the exorcism where he'd left off, because he couldn't think straight enough for Latin. His brain didn't want to stay in one place, didn't know where it was. He didn't make any sense, and knew it.

"Fair enough." The demon pulled its helmet, then mask off. It shrugged out of the air tank and tried to set it aside. It tipped over like the tank pulled it down, flopped onto its back, which arched slightly. It gurgled for a second. "Shit, shit, shit."

Instincts fought themselves within Dean. He wanted to help, but he wanted the guy to bleed out. It couldn't be both. He almost heard a _thwapthwap_ sound, a window shade flapping, or a movie reel spinning and spinning emptily. Not real. There were no windows here, no doors, no movie screens. He fumbled for his flask of holy water, couldn't find it. Something tugged at his arm. He looked to see what it was.

"Dean," Sam said weakly. "Hey."

And everything else seemed to disappear.

* * *

><p>He'd lain awake for what seemed a long while, unable or possibly unwilling to move. Everything hurt too much. He could tell there was grit in his eyes, and opening them would add to the hurt. Truthfully, Sam was afraid that if he opened his eyes now, he'd see that half the warehouse had fallen on top of him. That's what it felt like, something sharp on his gut, something much more yielding on his legs. Dust tickled his nose, so he breathed through his mouth and tried not to cough. As if they were separated by miles, he heard Dean say his name and then mutter an exorcism. Sam knew he had to show signs of life. He had to fix Dean, so maybe Dean could fix him. He opened his eyes, not surprised to learn he'd been right about the irritation, and about half the building being on him. His eyes started watering immediately, tears streaming hot down his temples.<p>

"Dean, hey," he said to get his brother's attention, but he couldn't hear his voice outside of his own head. His ears rang too loudly. He hadn't noticed that before, was almost all he could hear now.

Dean apparently heard, though, and his face peered from above and he seemed to be talking. Sam knew him by familiarity and common sense rather than sight or voice; he couldn't see well enough to know if Dean was okay any better than he could hear him. Of course he wasn't okay. Neither of them were. He let his eyes water unchecked, didn't think anyone there would blame him. For all he knew, they had the same problems. Dean wasn't in the right headspace to pull any mocking about crying like a baby. Whoever he had been talking to … Sam raised his head and squinted to see who Dean was trying to exorcise.

The softer heavy thing on his legs was a firefighter. Sam recognized the gear even with his blurry vision. The guy wasn't moving. A couple of feet away, another firefighter lay writhing with something dark jutting out of his left leg. Shit. Knife. He didn't remember that happening, of course, but he could do the math.

"Dean," Sam said again, as if Dean hadn't been rambling something at him for a minute or two. "What did you do?"

"The knife didn't work for some reason, but don't worry. I'm not going to let them hurt you," Dean said as he leaned close.

Suddenly, sound was crystal clear again. Sam heard Dean, he heard the creak of the warehouse settling and succumbing to fire, the guy with the knife stuck in him exhaling in quick, pained bursts. He thought he even heard faint shouts beyond the wall of wreckage, but that was probably wishful thinking.

"It seems to me the knife worked just fine," said the guy with said knife in his thigh, voice tight with pain and yet oddly calm. "Now listen. I'm a paramedic with the LA County Fire Department. I need you to let me stabilize my leg, check my partner and look over both of you while we wait for them to get us out. Two of my crewmates are right on the other side of that pile. If they're still alive, they're coming for us, and if they're not, others will. Until that happens, you need to let me do what I can to help."

All in all, Sam didn't think the guy sounded demony at all. He wondered what exactly Dean heard when his brother grabbed his arm and held on. Hurt like hell – Dean had latched on right where a bruise was forming, apparently – but contact was good. He had to somehow get control here. He just wasn't sure he could manage it. He let his head sink to the floor, too-familiar vertigo back in full force. Oh, he did not want to puke. He willed his stomach into submission while the vertigo slowed and stopped.

"Dean, listen to him. He's just a guy, and we should let him do all of that."

"Sam."

"He's not a demon. He's a man, and he can help us." Now that Sam could hear, he wasn't sure, but he felt like he was coming across as a bit drunk. Slurring couldn't be a good sign. He struggled onto his elbows, nodded at Dean for helping get some of the rubble off of him. "You should do the other part of what we do now. Save people. Help him."

The firefighter had managed to get to one knee, though he leaned heavily on a large heap of debris for balance. He didn't look much older than Dean, yet somehow also looked worlds older. Sam saw a dark stain surrounding the knife handle and frowned. Leg injuries were only treated like paper cuts on TV. In real life, they could be serious. Fatal, even. If they didn't suffocate and die in here, that guy wasn't going to be walking around joking with his pals at the end of the hour. And Dean had done that. The guy wasn't looking at them, only his friend. The lack of self-preservation on his part meant Sam had to make sure Dean didn't do more damage.

"Yeah, you're right, Sammy," Dean said, quiet and confused. "I know you have to be right. Not demons, just men."

Dean leaned across him, reached for the unconscious firefighter. Though he still looked twitchy to Sam, he'd taken a step in the right direction. Now Sam had to keep him on that path, if he could keep himself present. Had to, he had no choice. He didn't know what he could do if Dean suddenly slipped into delusion again and tried to hurt these men. The second Dean's hands landed on the firefighter, the other one moved.

"No, _Johnny_."

With speed that belied the injury, the firefighter lunged ahead and basically tossed himself between Dean and his buddy. Sam winced. He saw the pain running rampant across the guy's features, but underneath it was something he recognized too well. If these guys weren't brothers by blood, then they were brothers in spirit or by circumstance. It was reaction, plain and simple, no thought. It was exactly what Dean always did when he thought _Sam_ was in trouble.

Sam floundered a bit, managed to catch Dean's elbow, and Dean backed off with his hands up. The mannerism was so Dean that no one would ever know that two minutes earlier Dean was erratic and pretty much off his rocker. Well, maybe not no one. The firefighter eyeing Dean like he wasn't exactly one hundred percent in his right head remembered the Dean of two minutes ago, not that the Dean of right now would come off as sane to a civilian either.

"Hey, man, it's okay. It's okay," Sam said, not altogether sure who among them needed the most convincing.

The firefighter glanced at him, eyes wild, almost as wild as Sam had seen Dean's lately. Oh, boy. He couldn't … no one could expect him to work miracles under these conditions. He took a shallow breath, which was full of dust and he started coughing. That was, as it turned out, the miracle he needed. The tension in the air changed into brotherly concern on Dean's part and first responder concern on the firefighter's. He'd take the time to ponder the irony of his distress being a miracle further, except a minor coughing jag cued pains of various severity to make themselves known. He thought maybe he was in trouble, here.

"Sam," Dean said, right in his ear. "Take it easy. Just try to breathe past it."

Right, sure. Sam choked. Something was pressed against his face, and the air he was coughing started tasting cleaner. The coughs diminished, but every nerve ending felt raw and he couldn't even his breath out. The firefighter had dragged his tank and mask closer. Everything looked hazy, and he wasn't sure if that was the plastic facing or if he was going to pass out. He pulled his head back, but the mask remained in place. That was okay, it was helping. He stopped resisting and breathed.

"Your friend's not doin' too good," the firefighter said.

"What, you think you're like a genius or something?" Dean said. "I can see that."

"Look, I don't know what your story is. I don't _care_ what your story is. You're the asshole that just stabbed me, and yet I'm willing to work with you while we're stuck in here."

Not that any of them had much choice, Sam thought.

"Will you help me get my friend off him once I can get his head and back stable enough?"

Good, now that things had calmed a bit, it seemed this guy wasn't easy to rattle. Sam supposed that was a key quality to look for in a firefighter. His head was raised slightly, the mask strapped onto him. The paramedic appraised him quietly for a second.

"You keep this on and don't move," he said firmly. "I'll be back to check you over in a minute."

Sam nodded. He had no desire to attempt hacking up a lung again and wouldn't look gift oxygen in the mouth. For now the mask could stay, but for as long as he was able he was going to watch to make sure to give it up if someone else needed it. The dust had to be affecting all of them. He only knew as much as his own body's reaction, but it couldn't be good to breathe in as many dust particles as they all were.

"My brother," Sam said, surprised his voice was so croaky. "He's Dean, and my name's Sam. Dean, he hasn't been well. He didn't mean…"

"Yeah, they never do." The guy looked older than he was again. "I'm DeSoto, if you need to catch my attention before I can get back to check you over. Just so you know, I'm helping because it's what I do. Don't expect me to care too much."

That was absolutely valid, couldn't blame the guy. Sam blinked slowly, his lids not quite working at the same speed. He felt when the man was rolled off his legs a few minutes later, and he raised his neck and shoulders up to check on Dean. His brother watched DeSoto talk to his friend, and had an odd expression Sam had started to recognize as a precursor to _Cuckoo For Cocoa Puffs_. It was clear even considering Sam's unclear vision.

"Dean, come here." Sam waited until Dean was close, then grabbed his arm. "Stick near, huh?"

"Dude, these guys are …" Dean ran a shaky hand through his hands. "Do you know what…?"

"They're firefighters. Nothing more. You know this."

"You don't have to talk to me like I'm five."

Sam ignored the withering look in favor of making himself appear as miserable as possible, a trick that usually worked. It wasn't difficult to pull off, and worked as it always did. Dean cleared a spot next to him and sat watching DeSoto tend to his friend, who hadn't stirred at all as far as Sam could tell, then attempt to make the knife protruding from his own leg more secure. Sam was limited to an odd point of view, but it looked like the guy was starting to feel the effects of blood loss. Of all of them, Dean was in the best shape and that didn't give much comfort, all things considered.

"Sometimes I do, even when you don't think the world's being overrun by demons and turn into an arsonist," Sam said.

Of course, thanks to him their world was being overrun by demons. That was what they had to look forward to by getting back. That and Dean's demise. Sam appreciated Dean not mentioning that. For a second, Dean didn't respond except by blinking at him.

"What did you say?" Dean asked, as if Sam had just said 'potato, potato, potato, potato' instead of insulting him. "Hey."

Odd. Sam tried to repeat himself, but it was too much effort and didn't get past 'sometimes'. He retreated to that fugue state of not being awake, but not being asleep either. He just needed a minute or two. He heard Dean and DeSoto talking, an order to keep him awake, a metallic burst of static and tinny voices. Wanted to see what was going on, couldn't.

He must have drifted further into nothing than he realized, was startled when there was a shake to his shoulder and DeSoto's face appeared above his, then there were two DeSotos, three. Sam closed his eyes as the faces spun. He thought his legs felt funny, hands too, like they were full of trapped energy. He was worried about what that meant, for Dean as much as for him. He couldn't pass out. He had an awful thought that they'd never get back home if he passed out now. He doubted he was going to have much choice in the matter. DeSoto removed the mask and stared at his eyes for long enough Sam started to become uncomfortable with the scrutiny. Beside him, he sensed more than saw Dean stiffen. He fumbled a hand, patted Dean on the … foot. DeSoto frowned at him, then looked away.

"What?" Dean asked. "What is it?"

"His left pupil's dilated. His right's not."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you'd better hope they dig us out fast," DeSoto said. "Your brother probably has a serious head injury just like Joh – my partner, maybe a bleed."

"What?" Dean asked again. "He was all right and talking just a little while ago."

"I sincerely doubt he was all right, pal. Sometimes there's a cumulative effect, and it's only going to get worse."

"S' okay, m' okay," Sam said. He was a liar, liar, warehouse on fire. "Everything's going to be fine, you'll see."

The words in his head sounded nothing like the words that actually came out and this time Sam heard that too. He didn't understand why his brain mostly worked, but his mouth wasn't cooperating. Everything felt numb and yet painful. He wanted his arms and legs to stop feeling funny. He heard a strange noise, like someone was trying to talk with a sock in his mouth, realized with some detachment it was him, deteriorated from gibberish to nothing in a matter of seconds. He couldn't stop it, any of it. He failed. He bit his tongue, inhaled sharply. Blood, he tasted blood. Dean shouted, at him, at DeSoto, at demons that didn't exist. Volts of electricity in his arms, legs. Sheer, blinding panic. He couldn't breathe, coul…

* * *

><p>For a little while, Dean had been himself. He'd felt it. He'd also felt it snap. That weird sensation that had plagued him, whatever it was that he knew existed but didn't know how to explain, flapped in his brain over and over and he couldn't stop it if he tried. All he knew was Sam was scaring the crap out of him. He lost his shit, and himself. He could not deal with Sam's strong, flailing limbs in some sort of fit and the black-eyed son of a bitch trying to suffocate his brother at the same time, no way. First thing was to get the demon away from Sam, Sammy. He ignored the <em>thwapthwap<em> as best he could and stretched for the most obvious point of attack. Knife, Ruby's knife, still in the guy. He grabbed it and twisted, more than happy to hear the primal scream of pain from the demon. Maybe the knife would work this time. Maybe, if he could get it out and stick the demon in a more fatal place.

Blood everywhere, spurting. Big blood vessel in leg, Dean remembered. Good, good. The demon fell away from Sam, who continued shaking. Or, earthquake. No, it was Sam, hurt and wracked with spasms. Oh, shit. Demon had tried to kill his brother right in front of him and that shouldn't have happened. He grabbed his head for a second. How had he let the demons get at Sam like that? Didn't matter, didn't Sam, he had to make his brother stop doing that. Shouting, blood. More voices. More demons.

"Oh, hell, it's just like …"

"I need pressure bandages over here. DeSoto's gonna…"

"Someone check on this one, and Gage. We're going to need more hands."

Hands. There were demons all around Dean and they pulled at him. An arm around his throat hauled him away from Sam.

"Nnonono," Dean shouted.

"Someone get that guy out of our hair," a demon, no man, no demon said, wore a helmet with white stripe. "36's paramedics can handle him. They've got Lopez and Kelly out there already. Make sure there are some uniforms present too."

"Got him, Captain."

Small guy, covered in soot. Smoky. Stronger than he should be, because demon, demon black eyes. They were everywhere and they had Sam. _Thwapthwap._ In all the chaos, Dean had the realization he should have had what felt like a long time ago. That he needed Sam. Didn't just want to keep his brother safe, honest to goodness needed Sam to keep everything from going the wrong directions in his head. He fought hard as he was bodily removed over piles of brick and steel and ash, losing, lost.

Cool air, darkness of night. Smoke, faces. All of them with blank, black eyes, alternately laughing then glaring. On off, on off. Dean's head spun and none of this made sense. He … Sam. Sammy.

"Sam."

"Jesus, this one's strong," someone said in his ear.

Flat on his back, again without him understanding how, Dean stared at the cloudless but smoggy dark sky. Flashes of skin and black eyes swam into his line of sight every so often. He fought and fought, but could not free himself. Knees on his shoulders. Hands, probing and searching, a touch to his forehead, eyelids peeled back. Brightness. Darkness.

"He's banged up, but nothing too bad. I'll try to get Rampart to authorize police transport instead of ambulance."

"Gee, thanks."

"I don't know why you're complaining. I'm the one who'll get to ride back there with 'im."

"Perks of being the senior man, Reed."

"You're senior, all right."

Time and space blurred. Through whatever he was going though, his brain was stuck on Sam. Dean was face up, then he was face down. Sam. Cheek cut on sharp, small rocks. Sam. Cool steel on his wrists. Spinning streetlights and flashing red lights. Sam, Sam. Where was his brother? He twisted and turned and finally saw Sam, feet hanging off a short gurney, face too white. He felt his right shoulder strain, almost too far, as he tried to get to Sam.

"Anh, no you don't."

He was pulled the wrong direction. Vinyl squeaked underneath his ass, hands stained with blood pinned between the seat and his back. Demons had Sam. Bobby would help them, he needed Bobby to help him save Sam. The city whizzed by and his brain wouldn't stop looping even as the car he was in stopped and backed up slowly. Bright lights, white walls. People stared. He watched as they all blinked and revealed eyes dark as pitch. The sound of an automatic door whooshed, he turned. Sam on a stretcher, with demons all around him, wheeling him away. Jumbled thoughts in his head, things he knew were true and things he only thought were. Fire. Demons. Witch. Not the right time. Sam would help him. Sam knew where they were supposed to be (not here not now no) and how to fix it. Bracelets removed, fingers tightened their hold on his biceps.

They were everywhere, and multiplying fast. Dean wrested himself from the hold on his arms, powering forward. They had his brother. Sammy. Sam. This was wrong, wrong place, wrong time. Hands. Black demon eyes. Fire, fire, no. Bright lights. They were taking Sam somewhere away from him. If he could only think past the panic, but he couldn't. Sam was the only thing keeping him _him_. Seconds after freeing himself, Dean was caught again. Couldn't move, only inches. It wasn't enough. The panic bubbled. He could feel it, in his gut, his hands. He was sure his brain was fizzing like a goddamned can of Coke.

"Get your hands offa me," Dean shouted. Sam wasn't moving, but they were taking him. "Sam. Sammy!"

No one listened. No one helped him. Only Sam could, and Sam was… Dean got his arms free and swung wildly, his chest tight with a cough that wouldn't come. Fire. Smoke. He killed it, it was dead. He knew it was. Fight fire with fire. Demons all around him, spreading like an epidemic. Help, oh … oh. He couldn't see Sam anymore. One of the demons who had him wrenched his right arm behind his back, and up.

"The fire," he shouted. "Demons. Wrong time. Have to get back, back to the future. It's our density!"

"You want to give me a hand here, Reed?" one of the demons said, then grunted as Dean elbowed him with his left arm. "This one's got a real bee in his bonnet."

Breath hot on Dean's neck. Hot, burning. Fire demons. His skin would start blistering if he didn't get free soon. Everything started to fracture before his eyes. Black-eyed people loomed around him, each one becoming three, then four, until all he could see were faces with black eyes. They were suffocating him. He had to get to Sam. Sam needed him and he thought maybe he needed Sam even more. Knew it, the only thing he knew.

"Put him in six, and call extra security down here. Mike, we'll need psych."

One last effort yielded a knock of his forehead against the frame of a door, another bruise. If they got him in that room, Dean knew they would torture and then incinerate him just like they were doing to Sam right that very second. He screamed and kicked as they lifted him onto a thin mattress. They were so strong. Too many of them.

"Hold him. Get the restraints on him, now."

It was the leader demon speaking, Dean realized. He was in some sort of demon nest. He bucked, refused to give up. It wasn't in his blood to give up, and even if it was, he couldn't. Sam, he had to get to his brother. Couldn't. Too-strong hands held him fast and strapped him down. He must be on some kind of torture rack. Oh shit, oh god, Sam. This wasn't right. He had to think, think. Everything swirled above him, faces. A ceiling of big squares filled with holes. Couldn't catch his breath. He didn't want to die, he wasn't ready yet. This wasn't supposed to be happening. Sam was, where was Sam? His brother, at least was supposed to survive. The deal. He'd made the deal so Sam could live. But that was then, hadn't happened yet, because now was back then and _not right _time. Something metal and big, reached for him like a malformed arm.

Dean screamed. Terror. And he knew, deep down, how wrong this was. Winchesters didn't scream. Think, think. Had to keep his brain straight. A prick on his arm, something sliding into his veins like ice water. Dean thrashed on the bed, couldn't free himself. Felt his arms turn to wet noodles. Spaghetti arms. Oh no, oh no, no, no. He had to … something. Some … couldn't remember. _Thwapthwap_. The multitude of demonic images went hazy, then disappeared.


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N: You know how you get your hopes up for something and then it ends up disappointing you? That's how I felt last night, a bit. Hope you don't feel the same about this. One more chapter after this one..._**  
><strong>

**Chapter Five**

There was something in his veins, icy, snake-like. It made him feel strange. Dull. Dean couldn't keep his eyes focused, but there was nothing to see except sterile white and a dull glint of gray. There was something he had to remember, but he couldn't remember how to remember, which was stupid and there was something he had to remember.

* * *

><p>He knew he wasn't going to be able to run fast enough. He never could. He shot one last look over his shoulder, right into a gaping maw.<p>

And awoke in a sweat, the hot, moist breath of Hellhounds lingering virtually on the back of his neck.

Dean's heart raced. His mouth felt like a desert. The muscles in his arms and legs contracted in defensive reaction, but jerked short, nearly immobilized. He knew it had been a dream, but he also knew it had been real. Nothing made sense the way he knew it was supposed to. He was strapped down, sensed tightness on his wrists and ankles. Those were real, he thought. He heard muffled voices nearby, not close enough for him to hear what was being said. Dean couldn't breathe right, panic and dream fragments swimming around in his gut and lungs. He felt like he was under water.

He tried to remember where he was. Too many images flashed in his head, none of them sticking for more than a second. He and Sam were in a warehouse, then a different warehouse. Fire roared all around them. A library, Sam frowning at him and no fire, no computers. Wrong decade, wrong century. Wrong everything wrong. Demons emerged from around every corner. They had Sam. That image stuck. They had Sam and Sam was hurt, maybe dead by now.

"Sam," he said, involuntarily. His mouth clicked, tongue dry. "Sammy."

The voices came closer, grew clearer. He didn't recognize them, but then he wouldn't. Though he knew it would be futile, Dean strained against the ties holding him to the bed, squirmed and thrashed. There was only one thing he could think of – his brother. He had to get out of here and get to Sam. He didn't think anyone could save him from Hell, but he thought Sam could. Shit, shit. Think.

"Take it easy, fella," a man said. "We're going to do what we can to help you."

Help, help. A man in white, brown hair speckled with silver, kind eyes, no, no, not kind. No one here was kind. They couldn't be. Dean was trapped in demon headquarters, pinned down and separated from the one person he needed. He had to believe Sam was still alive. Sam was important to more than just him, but Dean didn't know how or why and he didn't have the time left to find any of that out. From somewhere near, a corner he imagined was dark, came a low, unearthly growl. Too soon, it was…

"Too soon," Dean cried. He had to get out of the restraints. "The deal was one year, you fucking demons."

"Okay," the man said. "I'd say this is pretty good indication the chloropromazine isn't doing the trick. I'd like to switch him over to thorazine, maybe haloperidol if he keeps escalating."

"The cops are chomping at the bit to get this guy behind bars, Steve," another voice said.

"That's not my number one priority, Joe," Steve said. "This man's experiencing a psychotic break. You saw the doctored ID – the date alone speaks to heavy belief in this delusion. You can see it; everyone in a five-room radius can hear it. Our job is to get him stable, not ship him off to an environment that'll only make him worse."

"There's no guarantee getting him back on treatment's going to do him any good. I think they said his brother was keeping him stable, and, well, without him there may be no point to any of this."

Dean didn't know what they were talking about. He stopped listening. It was all an illusion, a show to make him think this was something it wasn't. _Thwapthwap._ Were they torturing Sam like this right now too? He … Sam. A rush of adrenaline filled him, and he fought past the odd feeling of disuse and slight atrophy in his arms and legs. How long, he didn't know how long he'd been strapped down. Long time. Time was very important. If he could get out, there'd be time enough at last for… what? For Sam. What the demon had just said about Sam wasn't true. Dean wasn't "without him". No, no way.

He heard a tear of fabric, realized a moment later his left arm was free. He blinked, tried to clear his vision, waited until that face reappeared. It took half a second. Hands pulled at his arm to put it back in restraints. Dean fought, but it was like his brain wasn't capable of firing properly, his limbs refused to follow basic orders. There was a call for thorazine, more hands on his arm, and legs now too. He felt the drug, somehow, slip into his vein through an IV in his right hand. It was cold, numbing.

He'd remember this. He'd remember not to give himself away next time. There'd be a next time. Sam needed him. He needed Sam. The voices above shouted, but now sounded distorted and slow. That was supposed to be something that only happened in the mov…

* * *

><p>He wished he had had time to find his stuff. It wasn't anything important, but it was <em>his<em> stuff. His boots, though, they were important. He couldn't run fast enough barefoot. Dean slid into a stairwell, caught his breath for a moment. He had to admit, they had really rigged an amazing set up. Usually demons trawled old, dark places out of the way. The number of demons walking around here, right out in the open, was staggering. They were posing as doctors, nurses, and patients. As far as he could tell, he and Sam were the only ones not demonic. He was screwed, but he knew this was the only way. He had to find where they were keeping Sam. Then everything would be all right. He knew if he could reach Sam, Sam would be okay.

He had to go slow, not make any mistakes that could get him caught. There was time. All he had was time. He wasn't sure Sam did, and that thought made him want to move. No, no. Stay calm. He could do this. His mind went a million miles a second, rolled and rolled. He was used to it, almost.

Sam. Dean pictured Sam as he'd last seen him, and that did the trick. It was the only thing that did anymore. He needed to find something to cover his feet, maybe a robe so he could blend in a bit better as a regular patient. Regular, ha. He wasn't sure if this, any of it, was real so it didn't matter except that it might. He wasn't sure the demons were real, either. If nothing was real, then how was he supposed to know what to do?

Darkness surrounded him, and a strong odor of bleach. Dean flung out a hand, fingers came in contact with something stringy and wet. He jerked away from the unpleasant sensation. After a few moments, he realized he was in a janitorial closet. He had no recollection of how he'd gotten there, or why. He did recall needles and ice in his veins and demons. Always, demons. He tried to quell the panic and think, think, but he couldn't seem to manage. He knew he was alone and shouldn't be. He had to find Sam.

Dean clambered to his feet, unsteadily wavered for a moment and leaned on the door to regain his equilibrium. He could figure out what had happened later, right now only Sam mattered. He opened the door to a bright, empty corridor. That wasn't right. There'd been demons everywhere, he was certain of that. He didn't care. He'd take advantage of the freedom while he could, search room by room if he had to.

"Third floor's clear," a tinny, faint voice announced that he was not alone. "Security detail is in place on room 325."

They might have meant Sam was in that room; it was too obvious of a trap. Dean knew he wasn't processing right, but he was not that big of a fool. Sam wasn't on this floor, if this floor was real or fake. He ducked back into the closet when footsteps approached, the bodies that belonged to the voices. With the door cracked, he saw two demons wearing cops as they strutted through the empty hallway. Lockdown. He reached for his holy water, but it wasn't there. He was in hospital scrubs. No flask, no matches, no blade. No way to burn these things out or send them back to hell quick and easy. Couldn't burn the place to the ground until he had Sam. He had to keep his mind on Sam.

He gave it a full thirty second count after the demon cops' footsteps faded to nothing. It was clear now, everything made sense. He'd burn this place to the ground. His fingers itched with the urge, the need. Fight fire with fire, but Sam first. Sam.

* * *

><p>Dean sat in a hard plastic chair, ducked low both because he could not seem to sit straight and because they were looking for him. He had a feeling he'd been lucky to find Sam alone. Sam was … not right. He'd almost walked right past his brother's body, that's what it was, a shell. Not completely Sam. Not good. This wasn't good. He clutched Sam's forearm like if he let go, Sam would slip away. He should have been with his brother all along, didn't remember clearly why he hadn't been. He never would have let Sam get like this, all white and gaunt with a tube down his throat. He couldn't get Sam out of there when he was so sick.<p>

He felt calm next to Sam, but panicked all the same. Dean didn't know how to deal with this. If he left Sam, then he'd revert to that state of mind where nothing made sense even while it made perfect sense. He had no choice. He had an idea that was probably stupid, but he had to try. He riffled through the small bedside stand in search of Sam's belongings, if there were any. The only thing he felt with certainty was that Sam was the key for him to keep functioning halfway normal. He didn't know how or why and didn't care. He had to make it work. He found nothing of Sam's. Of course. They wouldn't keep personal stuff unguarded, so it might be at the nurse's station.

"I'll be back for you, Sammy. You … you better hang on," Dean said quietly. "You're the only thing that's gonna get me through these next couple of months."

Or minutes or days.

He forgot to clear the hallway, a critical mistake. The second he stepped out of Sam's room, he was besieged by angry shouts from three sides. Guns pointed at him, barrels like dark, black eyes, and he couldn't fight, couldn't run. Dean tried to do both and got overwhelmed quickly. Demons everywhere. He'd been there before. It was the same. It was different. It couldn't be both, yet it was. He felt the thing, the weird sensation of mental spinning, coming this time, now like he somehow knew he always had. Would he remember this? He didn't know if it was really happening, but it was really happening and he hadn't a chance in hell, Hell, demons instead of hounds. That wasn't how it was supposed to be.

Something clubbed him on the side of the head. He heard someone shout NO, saw stars, then his arms were yanked behind him roughly. More stars, brighter. A mechanical whine, flashes, cameras. A cry for answers, a protest of police mistreatment. Dean struggled. It was no use. The demons tossed him in the back of an old police squad, clunked his head against the edge of the car. His vision went gray. He couldn't catch a breath or a break. Sam. They were separating them even more. A sick pit formed in his belly. He was never going to see Sam again. Think, think, thinking only made it worse.

* * *

><p>"Well, don't you look like seven kinds of shit?"<p>

A face stared down at him. It belonged to a large man, jowls, mostly bald with a thin moustache and wearing a tan polyester suit that seemed to have absorbed at least a year's worth of rancid sweat. He sounded like he'd just run a marathon walking to Dean's cell. He breathed so heavily, Dean could feel the hot air gusting against his face though the man was standing and he himself was flat on his back. Hot breath, like the hounds that chased him every time he shut his eyes, eyes, the man's eyes blinked. Normal one second, black as pitch the second. Dean should be used to it, but they had him in a small cage, and he couldn't breathe or think, think. The whole city of LA was made up of demons. Impossible. He recoiled, but his whole body felt weak and off. His head hurt and he heard a vague and unreal thwappy sound.

"What…?"

"The things I do for you couple of idiots," the man said. "I'm your 'lawyer', I've come to post your bail."

"You're another demon," Dean said.

"Of course I am, Short Bus. That big reveal happened a few months ago. Try to keep up."

"What?"

Dean sat slowly, dizziness made him queasy. Something was there at the tip of his memory, but it wouldn't stick. He pressed the butt of his right hand against his temple, winced at the pain and realization he had a bump there. He felt off, fuzziness in his head. His eyes burned. He felt it when his face ticked, lip curling and uncurling without him intending for it. His whole body ached, and it, it, fire and demons and Sam, Sammy.

"What did you say?"

"Please. Are you going to say you don't recognize me?" It spread its arms wide and did a slow circle. "We work with what we have available. The girl you know hasn't come close to being born yet, and since I learned all I know about time spells from the guy who sent you here, it was the best I could do."

When Dean didn't say anything, the demon tilted its head slightly, narrowed its eyes and studied him for a moment. It muttered under its breath, then reached for his face. He tried to evade the touch, but there was nowhere to go. The sweaty palm slapped against his forehead, clamped on tight and there was humming in his ears. The sound rose in pitch until it made him want to scream, so he did, until his throat hurt. He almost passed out when the grip was released at long last. His ears continued to buzz.

"I got to give that witch some credit for this one. He really screwed you up. Too bad I couldn't have left you like that," the demon said. "All you ever do is make my life miserable."

Dean felt like he was coming out of a fog, that everything behind him was swallowed up by it, disappeared into nonexistence. He didn't know where he was or how he'd gotten there, but he thought if he tried hard enough he'd figure it out. He blinked at the demon standing in front of him, arms folded across its chest, one eyebrow raised. The mannerisms were familiar, and so was the attitude.

"Ruby?"

"In the flesh, moron," Ruby said. "I'm here to rescue your sorry asses. We don't have a lot of time here. Your stink was all over the witch and now I know why, but Sam's wasn't. We have to find him the old fashioned way and we're on a timetable. Where's your brother, Dean?"

Sam, Sam. Dean tried to clear his head. It was more difficult than he thought possible. Too many things flashed in his mind's eye, and none of them seemed quite right.

"You're taking too long. Let's move this show on the road," Ruby said. It was surreal how she sounded the same as a middle-aged overweight man. "It'll probably take a while for you to be back to normal, and you've always been on the dumb side anyway."

"Fuck you, demon bitch."

"Yet I can always count on you for witty repartee." Ruby turned and stalked out, tossing over her broad, amply padded shoulder, "Come on."

He noticed belatedly the door to his cell had been left open. He felt a bit out of his element and beyond confused, but Dean didn't think he had much choice. He followed Ruby, grimaced in anger and disgust. There were uniformed bodies on the floor, some bloody. No demons were there but the one he had to count on as a temporary ally. His head wasn't spinning. Everything that had been in the fog became clearer and clearer with each step. He didn't like the pictures he saw, the ones in front of him and the disconnected pieces of memory. He frowned at the number of people down for the count.

"Relax, Dudley Do Right, I didn't kill any of them." Ruby turned her mostly bald, slightly sweaty very male head to look at him. "You don't mess with that kind of thing. The goal is to get you out without doing any more damage than you already did."

Damage. Dean remembered fire all around and the walls caving in on him. Sam had been there too. He remembered Sam, unconscious, being taken by two demons. He thought maybe they hadn't been demons. He didn't know what memories to trust. Everything was still fragmented, as if he had gaping holes in his brain. He probably did. He didn't understand any of this. He wished Sam were … Sam was hurt. Sam in a hospital bed, the clearest image yet.

"I think Sam's in a hospital," Dean said.

"Hospital? What happened, is he okay?"

The slow beep of a heart monitor, a faint whoosh of the vent breathing for Sam. Dean found the nearest wall and leaned on it for support.

"No. I don't think he is."

"That complicates things. LA's not a small town. Any idea which hospital?"

"I don't know. I didn't know it was real. I thought … I don't know what I thought."

"Super. Looks like we've got a lot of legwork to do and not a lot of time to do it."

Dean stepped over a guy who let out a low moan and started moving. If he had been locked up, that meant they couldn't waltz around for long without a big mess. It also meant he couldn't just walk into whatever hospital Sam was in and carry him out over his shoulder. Not in a prison jumpsuit, not feeling so shaky, not at all.

* * *

><p>Rampart General Hospital might as well have been a fortress, which only confirmed to him that this was where Sam was. There was police presence at every entrance, and a few cars circled the parking lots slowly.<p>

"This is fantastic," Ruby said. "I really picked the wrong body for stealth."

Dean tried not to think of the poor guy Ruby was possessing, or of the long-term side effects of demonic possession in general. Maybe he was biased, but he'd bet being a meat suit for Ruby was somehow worse than for a standard, run of the mill demon. The olive green polyester suit with deep orange satin shirt she'd procured for him to wear was a small example of her sadism. His skin itched.

Actually, everything about him itched at being this close to his brother and so far removed at the same time. He wasn't even sure if he meant that literally or figuratively, knowing that the closer they got to May, the further Sam was retreating into searches to save Dean and more and more dependence on Ruby. Dean saw it happening, which was as big a reason for his distrust of her as her demonic nature. Those reasons were intertwined. He knew Ruby's promises were empty. She was a demon. Sam knew it too, but the difference was that Sam was approaching the desperate stage, the one Dean knew too well.

He was banking on Sam being stronger than him. Sam _was_ stronger than him, strong enough that he was going to pull through this so he could pull through Dean going to Hell for him.

"Dean, hey." Ruby jostled his shoulder. "I asked you a question. Do you remember where Sam's room is?"

"Nuh…" Dean saw a door, his own shaky hand reaching for it. A big sign proclaiming it Level 6. "Sixth, I think. I'm pretty sure. Don't expect a room number."

"Okay, well, we're not going to bust in with over half of LA's police force staking the place out." Ruby rubbed a hand over her face, scowling when her fat fingers came in contact with the moustache. "Maybe if I can't be covert I should use what Bernard here seems perfect for. I'm going to go fake a heart attack or something to distract them long enough for you to slip in. Once you're in, head right for six. We'll find each other up there."

"Fine," Dean said. It wasn't like he could come up with a better plan. He still hadn't put all the pieces together. "I hope you know what you're doing."

"Please," Ruby said. "I'm more awesome than you can possibly know."

Then she left him, headed for the emergency entrance. As she drew closer, she … Bernard's body began to list and stagger. The cops standing duty rushed for the seemingly ill man, and several hospital personnel darted out at the shouts. Dean had to hand it to Ruby, she put everything into the performance and it worked beautifully. He tried not to think about how she was going to end the scam and make it to the sixth floor, not sure he believed her about not killing people. He also didn't want to think about how she intended on getting them back to their own time. Damned skanky witch probably had a dead rabbit on her somewhere.

It was easy getting in. Beefed up security here was nothing compared to what he and Sam had to deal with every day; they weren't the only ones without access to proper technological advances. The chaos Ruby created was enough to get him through the emergency lobby to a stairwell within minutes and with hardly a glance from anyone. The place looked familiar, but not in a tangible way, the same way he knew he was in 1975 yet had no practical frame of reference beyond the bad clothes and abundance of amazing classic cars he hadn't had time to admire properly. For days, he'd been over the hills and far away and had had no real idea. A very, very small part of him regretted that.

Dean made it to the sixth floor, found himself unaccountably winded, shaky. The words thorazine and haloperidol floated through his head in a voice he didn't know, but must know or it wouldn't be a memory. He'd remember those words, thought they must have something to do with how shitty he felt. Sam would know what they meant, though Dean already suspected and added side effects of drugs to his list of things he didn't want to contemplate at the moment. He cracked the door, saw business was being conducted as normal despite the lockdown at the hospital entrances … except two boys in blue standing outside one room in particular. Sam's, had to be. He had to get them away, and had no idea how.

Before he could devise what would no doubt be a masterful plan, a nurse built like a battering ram and wearing an ill-fitting uniform strode to the room. Dean watched her make small talk with the cops for a moment, lift her left hand behind the back of one and gesture toward the room. She went in then. Dean was confused, until not more than two seconds later the cops turned abruptly and entered the room. The hand gestures made sense then.

Ruby had jumped bodies.

Dean left the stairwell and walked quickly to Sam's room. No one paid him any mind, though it felt like he was being obviously nervous and twitchy. It was ridiculously easy to walk right into Sam's room, where he stopped short when he saw his brother lying there. His warped memories had been bad, but reality was like a punch to the gut.

"Sam," he whispered. Dean couldn't remember what had happened, let alone what was wrong with his brother. "Jeez."

"All the king's horses and all the king's men, that's me," Ruby said as she started disconnecting wires. "Let's get Humpty home and put back together again."

"Are you sure we should move him? We don't even know what's wrong with him."

"What do you propose as an alternative, dipshit? We go and we go now. I grabbed his chart, and I managed to find yours and your arrest records too. It'll be like you were never here." Ruby pursed lips that were painted an unflattering pinkish orange, which coincidentally matched her new temporary body's hair color. "You're welcome. Now come over here."

She'd muttered something earlier about time moving differently here, and that her body in 2008 had a limited window for her to hop back into it. To be honest, he hadn't been paying much attention then, and he sure as hell wasn't now. Even if he cared to devote attention to her, the roaring in his ears made it impossible to concentrate on anything but the wasted appearance of his brother. Sam wasn't going to make it. Dean had a sick feeling in his stomach.

"Now, Dean. The bus is leaving in a ten count." Ruby yanked the IV from Sam's left arm, disregarded the blood. "I will leave your ass here. Take my hand. It could be a bumpy ride for you and Sam's going to need your help when we get no place like home."

Sam, he heard. He moved to the side of Sam's bed. Dean reached for Ruby's hand, and Sam's. Then it was like he stood in one place, but the room swirled around him. Faster and faster until he began to feel like he could throw up. In his head, he imagined Gene Wilder with his stupid top hat and crazy hair, singing, "_There's no earthly way of knowing, which direction we are going…"_

And then all of a sudden everything stopped. There were dark, red walls, the smell of old books and whisky. The floor rushed up to say hello.


	6. Chapter 6

_A/N: Thanks for reading! _

**Chapter Six **

"I'm going to kill that son of a bitch," Dean said. "As soon as you open your eyes and show me you'll be all right, I'll find it and kill it with my bare hands."

Three days he'd sat there, sometimes lain in the bed next to Sam's when his own body had had too much of its own detox. Drugs were bad, who knew? Three days, and still Sam was unresponsive. Dean didn't care about the medical mumbo jumbo about second impact head injuries and the statistics for survival didn't apply here. Sam was going to be fine. He didn't sell his soul for Sam to live in a persistent coma until he faded into nothing. No way.

"You'd be too late with that," Bobby said.

Dean turned and found Bobby leaning on the doorframe, half in and half out of the room, arms crossed over his chest. At Dean's nod, he entered and approached Sam's bed.

"Sam's mysterious black-eyed benefactor got a little overzealous when grilling the aforementioned son of a bitch for information." Bobby shrugged. "I can't say's I'm too torn up over her indiscretion in this case. That witch was bad juju."

"Yeah, I suppose you're right."

"Surprised she didn't tell you herself. Modesty ain't that walking demonic pestilence's strong suit."

Sometimes it gave Dean comfort to know he wasn't the only one who'd rather use descriptors than call her by name when it came to Ruby. He didn't trust her as far as he could throw her, but as more things became clear in his own head about what had happened to him and Sam, the more he realized he owed her. With Sam out for the count and him, as Ruby put it, with his brain set to run circles like a hamster on a wheel, chances were they would have bought it in 1975. It'd be a cold day in Hell he gave her anything but begrudging thanks, though. Winchesters didn't make friends with demons. Period.

"It's not like we're BFFs, Bobby. We don't talk, we don't text. She's got a thing for Sam, not me."

"I thought maybe it was that unresolved sexual tension thing." Bobby had the decency to look vaguely ill for even implying that. Or maybe it was something else, Sam hovering barely on the right side of death, for example. "I gotta tell you, that poor girl she's wearing … it wasn't pretty, sitting with her while the demon went to collect you two idjits. That creature is dark and nasty, I don't care what she's trying to peddle to your brother."

Bobby shuddered, then straightened his shoulders as if to say they'd talked enough about untrustworthy demons. Dean was more than all right with that.

"How's he doin' today?"

"No change," Dean said. He leaned his elbows on his knees, blew out a breath and glared at the monitors hooked up to Sam. "I dunno, I guess I thought that modern medicine would be able to fix him right away, you know?"

At the heart of it, he felt guilty. Sam must have been injured from the start, the first blow to the head happening when the witch whammied them back a few decades. If Dean had been normal, he'd have noticed Sam was hurt. If Dean had been normal, they wouldn't have been in the warehouse with it burning and falling around them. The second impact wouldn't have happened and Sam's brain would be just fine right now. What he remembered was in pieces, flashes, really, but it was enough. Intellectually, he knew it wasn't his fault his head got scrambled.

Emotionally, it was all his fault.

"He'll come out of it soon," Bobby said gruffly. "That boy is stubborn just like all you Winchesters are."

"I hope you're right, Bobby."

"Ain't I always?" Bobby eased into the chair on the far side of Sam's bed. "You need to lie down again, son. You're starting to look as bad as Sam."

"I'm fine."

"Bullshit. What did I just say about always being right?" Bobby narrowed his eyes in closer appraisal. "Actually, you could probably use a decent meal first. Get yourself to the cafeteria. Their sandwiches are good, and so's the mac and cheese. I'll be here with your brother."

"Bob –"

"No arguin'. Go. I'll call if we need you," Bobby said. "And bring me back an oatmeal raisin cookie."

He _was_ hungry. What he remembered from 1975 cuisine called to mind dumpsters and things pumped with preservatives and wrapped in cellophane. Neither of those things bothered him that much, but it wasn't like it was ever his first choice. Since their sudden, nauseating return to the present, food hadn't been first and foremost on his list of things to worry about. Dean reluctantly headed for the door and to the cafeteria. He told himself Sam would be pissed to wake up and find Dean down ten pounds and looking like an extra from _Night of the Living Dead_. Which was, he thought with a sardonic smile, made before 1975, so being an actual extra would require more time travel.

The worker ringing up his food had nametag on. Barbara. He couldn't resist the, "They're coming to get you, Barbara." that came out of his mouth though he regretted it immediately. Win some, lose more. That was his ratio lately and in the near future, but he didn't want to think about that. Couldn't think about that until Sam woke up. Appetite almost gone, Dean picked a table by a big picture window and the sharp cheddar scent from the pasta whetted it again.

He was half done with his second roast beef sandwich and dish of macaroni and cheese – both things Bobby had not exaggerated about, but his enjoyment was probably more indicative of his hunger than anything – when his phone rang. He made it to his feet before the first ring completed, already walking for the door and food forgotten. It was Bobby's ringtone.

"On my way," he barked into the phone without waiting to hear what the call was about.

He skipped the elevators and jogged the stairs instead, reached Sam's room in under ten minutes. Dean rounded the corner, saw a doctor obstructing his view of his brother. He watched Sam's legs move. He started forward, but was held back by a hand on his left arm.

"Give the doc a minute," Bobby said, voice thick. "Didn't I tell you, boy? He's gonna be fine."

Bobby was always right.

* * *

><p>A head injury severe enough to put a person in a coma wasn't something anyone woke up from ready to dance a jig or even read a book. The first twenty-four hours of his reemergence into the world were ones Sam would never remember or understand, much the way he couldn't remember how he ended up hospitalized to begin with. The day and a half after that, he remembered as someone seen as a medical anomaly, a living miracle.<p>

It was no miracle.

Sam knew that, and he suspected Dean and Bobby knew it as well even though neither of them mentioned it now, or ever would. He owed his good neurological and general physical health to Ruby. She was the first thing Sam remembered with any clarity, her standing above him with what passed for concern on her face; she was a demon, after all, and he was under no illusion that she cared for him in the way Dean or Bobby did.

"_Ruby?" he asked, throat sore, thoughts foggy. _

_Her face and hair had a faint green tint. Light from monitors, Sam realized, and he was in the hospital. He had a pain in his head and a full body ache he recognized as being from inactivity. He lifted his head, expected Dean to be right there. He was, but he was sleeping deeply. He frowned. That wasn't right. Dean had a hair trigger on consciousness._

"_What's going on? What happened?"_

"_You had brain damage. Now you don't," Ruby said with a shrug. "You were in 1975 LA, now you're in Bumfuck, South Dakota and it's 2008. I had to steal someone else's mojo to do it, but I bent space AND time for you."_

"_Uh. What?"_

_He blinked. None of it made a lick of sense to him, but his brain was stuck on … brain damage. That could mean quite a few different things, but most people meant the bad things when they said it. It was hard for Sam to glean meaning from Ruby's words and tone even when he wasn't waking up from, well, brain damage. He blinked again, to really emphasize his confusion._

"_It's a long story. Being the kind and generous person that I am, I'll let Dean tell it to you. He'll be creaming his pants when he wakes up and sees you're back to your usual genius self." _

_Said with the undisguised derision Ruby always had when she spoke to or about Dean, of course. Sam sneaked another look at his slumbering brother. It wasn't normal for Dean to sleep this deeply, and in the dim light, Sam thought Dean looked pale. Maybe Dean had … had, he remembered Dean had been broken. Was he still?_

"_Don't worry about Chachi over there. He's fine, or as regular stupid as he always was," Ruby said, then with something that sounded softer, more genuine, "I consider it my job to protect you, from everything. Try not to do something this stupid again, huh?"_

_Sam closed his eyes. He didn't know what stupid thing he'd done, not really. He tried to recall. All he remembered was Hellhounds that weren't real, a warehouse that wasn't real. That nothing was real except a witch that was too strong for them and Dean being wrong and fire. Everything else was shadowy, just out of reach. He thought maybe in time it would come to him, and apparently he had that time thanks to Ruby. _

"_I…" he said._

_He was talking to no one. Ruby was gone._

"You ready to blow this Popsicle stand?"

Dean had been ready to skip the hospital the morning he woke up to find Sam one hundred percent Sam, but that plan had been thwarted by the appearance of the doctor in charge of his care. Upon seeing Sam upright and talking as if nothing had happened and he hadn't been in a coma, the doctor ordered about a billion tests and Sam had become like that rare animal in a zoo – put on show for certain hours and poked, prodded and generally not left alone for a minute for a solid day and night.

"More than," Sam said.

He was down almost six days, which was in a way something to be thankful for. Apparently Ruby had explained to Dean and Bobby something about a time dilation effect and that she could only do what she could do (with a side of acerbic hints that they should be grateful they'd gotten even that, an aside Sam didn't need to hear had happened but didn't doubt _did)_, but Sam didn't much care. A full week in 1975 had translated to one day in 2008, followed by a few days in the hospital in their own time. He was down a little, but not as much as he could have been. He could still save his brother. Not if he stuck around here as a lab experiment, though.

"Let's break for it before Doogie Howser comes back to test your pee or poop or spooge again."

Yes, that was the man Sam was ready to lay down everything to save. He knew Dean was trying to get a rise out of him, so he rolled his eyes. To tell the truth, he was so damn glad to have Dean acting like his regular self that he didn't mind much. He didn't remember the hours leading up to his near fatal injury, but he doubted he'd ever forget Dean unhinged, himself but not himself. He had no intention of sharing that part of the story with Dean, not if he could help it. Dean didn't need to know his obsession with fire and demons had gotten that bad. He had to hope Dean wouldn't remember on his own; he knew they wouldn't talk about it if that were the case anyway. There wasn't time.

He wondered if there would ever be enough time. His brain might be all right, but that sick pit in his stomach kept getting worse and worse.

"Gross, Dean," Sam said. "Weren't you around each time they tested me for something?"

Dean grumbled under his breath and walked out.

Sam followed, without a backwards glance. There hadn't been a minute to actually talk about what they'd been through, the whole time travel thing, and he had questions he wasn't sure he'd ever get the answers to. Like, why and how the witch shipped them decades in the past. Now that they were leaving the fishbowl environment, maybe they'd put some pieces together. He wasn't sure any of it mattered, he was just grateful Ruby had been able to make things right. She really had been instrumental in fixing everything: she saved them from dying thirty years ago, unscrambled Dean's brain, fixed Sam's, and killed the witch that started it all.

Ruby's assistance was a convenience Sam wasn't going to bat an eyelash at, not in this case. He still didn't trust her, but at the same time thought now she was the only one who could help him save Dean, just like she'd told him all along. He watched as Dean managed to flirt with everyone wearing a skirt as he made for the elevator. Even the sad remnants of mutton chop sideburns didn't lessen Dean's charm. He vowed to try to memorialize the look before Dean came to his senses and shaved. Sooner or later Dean would realize he looked like a giant dork. He smiled, but was suddenly struck with a hint of sadness and that desperate feeling cropped back up. If trusting Ruby would help him keep Dean topside, Sam resolved that he would do what he had to do. No more stupid hunts.

No more stupid mistakes.


End file.
